Tokyo: Japan Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said Saturday (Dec. 18) that the country will extend its tight entry rules until at least early next year to prevent the spread of the omicron variant of the coronavirus.

The Japanese government initially said the rules, banning new entry by foreign nationals worldwide and requiring returning Japanese nationals and foreign residents to quarantine in government-designated facilities, would be in place for about a month to the year’s end.

Kishida told reporters that the government will continue with the rules until more details of the omicron variant are known.

“We will study the situation after the year-end and New Year’s (holiday),” he said.

Japan reversed an easing of controls late last month as omicron spread around the world. The country has one of the world’s strictest border policies, with only citizens and foreign residents allowed to enter, in principle.

Although COVID-19 cases have fallen dramatically since a deadly wave in August, there is growing concern over the omicron variant, which has been found more than 30 times in Japan, mostly during airport screenings and quarantine.

But the threat of a community spread of the variant has grown after a woman in her 20s tested positive for omicron while she was quarantining at her home in Tokyo after arriving from Texas on Dec. 8.

On Thursday (Dec. 16), the health ministry’s coronavirus advisory board urged the government to beef up protection measures at ports and airports and conduct PCR screenings to detect variants for all COVID-19 cases, on the assumption that it will spread in the country sooner or later.

So far, the government has denied that the latest cases are examples of community infection, saying they are closely monitored cases that are traceable, even if they slipped through the initial testing at airports.