A total of 9,649 people had overstayed as of July last year. Among them are people who came to Japan under the guise of being tourists, but then began working illegally at a farm near Narita Airport in the Kanto region.

As it is difficult to determine on arrival who is entering the country to work, the number of such cases is expected to increase going forward.

In July 2013, the government exempted Thai citizens with IC passports from obtaining visas for stays of 15 days or less, and in December 2014 provided roughly the same conditions for Indonesians. The government has been expanding the number of countries subject to visa exemptions in the hope of attracting tourists from Asian countries that are experiencing economic growth.

According to the Immigration Services Agency, the number of new arrivals from Thailand on short-term stays grew from 633,471 in 2014 to 1,095,497 in 2018, a 1.72-fold increase.

For Indonesian arrivals, the growth has been 2.56-fold, from 137,725 to 353,455 people.

As the number of people entering the country from both nations has increased, so has the number of people staying in the country illegally. Overstays from Thailand rose from 3,821 as of January 2014 to 7,557 as of July last year, a 1.97-fold increase. Indonesian overstays have increased 3.58-fold, from 583 to 2,092 people.

‘Cheap, convenient’ labor

Farmers in Chiba and Ibaraki prefectures near Narita Airport prize these “fake tourists” who can be used to cheaply resolve labor shortages when necessary. Brokers apparently play a role in making the connections.

“They’re illegal so they’re cheap to use and there are no annoying checks. It’s kind of convenient,” said a 70-year-old farmer who grows green onions in Asahi, Chiba Prefecture.

In November last year, the man was arrested by the Chiba prefectural police for violating the provision against assisting illegal employment in the Immigration Control and Refugee Recognition Law. He was fined ¥500,000 for illegally employing people from Thailand who had entered the country “for tourism.”

The man had been using foreign technical interns for about 20 years until about three years ago. A total of nine Chinese and Filipinos had been working for him, but they became embroiled in a dispute about overtime during the busy season and some suddenly disappeared.

The man also said it was troublesome to prepare documents to submit to the organization that oversaw the trainees, and to deal with the monthly visits by the organization to check on what the trainees were doing.

It was around that time when he was approached by a Thai woman, 49, who was married to a local Japanese. “I can introduce you to people you can use freely,” he quoted her as saying.

She introduced him to three Thais who had entered the country as tourists. He knew it was illegal, but was willing to hire them because “the other farmers around me were doing the same,” he said.

They were cheaper than paying trainees the minimum wage. He paid them ¥850 per hour for 10 hours a day. During the busy season some worked 310 hours a month.

“They were happy to work as much as they could and didn’t complain about the low pay. It was much better than having the trainees,” he said.

In the case involving the prefectural police, a Thai woman who acted as an intermediary was also arrested and fined ¥500,000. According to the police, the woman received about ¥300,000 per person as a “referral fee,” and instructed people to come to Japan as couples to make them appear more like tourists.

The 10,086 illegal workers caught in 2018 included 1,868 Thais and 594 Indonesians. Of these, 75% of the Thais and 52% of the Indonesians were working in Chiba and Ibaraki prefectures.

The Immigration Services Agency believes that brokers with connections to both farmers and people in their home countries are recruiting many interested people from their home countries.

Wild animals sold at a seafood market in Wuhan could be the source of the outbreak, Gao said, adding that Chinese scientists have cultured, isolated and analyzed the genetic makeup of the microorganism, which is a key step in understanding the new strain of coronavirus and producing a vaccine.

The exact animal carrier is still being investigated even as the virus undergoes adaptations and mutations, he said, adding that, “It is like a cat-and-mouse game. Our understanding of the virus will deepen with further research.”

Gao said that of the seven known coronaviruses that can infect humans, four are less harmful than seasonal influenza. However, SARS(severe acute respiratory syndrome) and MERS (Middle East respiratory syndrome) are exceptions, and researchers are still racing to learn more about the newest strain.

A study published in the journal Science China Life Science suggests the new coronavirus strain is likely to have originated in bats, but there may be intermediate hosts between bats and humans.

Bats are known to carry some of nature’s deadliest viruses, including Nipah, Hendra, Ebola, Marburg and SARS, according to the World Health Organization. These viruses do not harm bats due to the flying mammals’ incredibly strong immune systems. But they can wreak havoc on humans and other animals.

The new viral strain is also genetically more similar to SARS than MERS. Around 88 percent of its gene sequence is identical to a SARS sample collected in 2017 from a cave of Chinese bats that proved to be the source of SARS, the National Genomics Data Center in Beijing reported in a study on Wednesday.

Despite the genetic similarity, the new virus is neither SARS nor MERS, but a close relative that belongs to a different class called the betacoronavirus-a single-stranded RNA virus that can infect wild animals, livestock and humans, the center said.

In addition, 393 suspected cases were reported as of Wednesday midnight. All the reported deaths were in Hubei province, the epicenter of the outbreak.

Outside the mainland, Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan each confirmed one case.

Thailand confirmed three cases, while the United States, Japan and South Korea reported one confirmed case each, the commission said.

Health authorities have traced 5,897 people who had close contact with the patients, and 969 of them have been released from medical observation, with 4,928 still under medical observation.

Earlier on the same day, the government of Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreaks, announced a suspension of the city’s public transport system, including buses, subway and ferry, and exits of airport and railway stations in the city, for disease control.

Upgraded measures are being taken to contain the outbreak of viral pneumonia within Wuhan, the epicenter of the disease, to prevent it further spreading to other regions.

“We must be steadfast and strong to keep the outbreak within Wuhan. We’ll urge Hubei province and the city of Wuhan to take the strictest measures for prevention and control,” Li Bin, vice-minister of the National Health Commission, said on Wednesday.

Such measures include intensifying supervision of open-air markets, minimizing public activities, taking the strictest measures regarding people with fever and preventing the outbreak from further spreading, he said at a news conference organized by the State Council Information Office.

The Wuhan government required all people in public places such as hotels, restaurants, cinemas, parks, shopping centers and public transportation to wear masks to prevent the spread of the virus, according to an announcement on Wednesday night. The rule took effect immediately.

On Wednesday night, the Hubei provincial government reported 444 confirmed cases of the new coronavirus in Hubei alone as of 8 pm. The death toll climbed from nine at Tuesday midnight to 17.

On Wednesday, the disease further spread across the country. Health authorities in Shanxi, Fujian, Gui­zhou and Hebei provinces, as well as the Ningxia Hui autonomous region, confirmed their first infection cases.

In Macao, the region’s government on Wednesday morning announced its first confirmed case. The patient is a 52-year-old female traveler from Wuhan.

In Hong Kong, health authorities confirmed its first case of coronavirus pneumonia, according to local media. The 39-year-old man lives in Wuhan and arrived in Hong Kong on Tuesday evening. He was detected with fever and a cough at the high-speed railway station in Hong Kong.

“Human-to-human transmission of the disease has appeared, and the virus is likely to mutate. There are risks of the further spread of the disease,” Li said, adding that the ongoing traffic peak with the upcoming Spring Festival has increased the risks of it spreading, which requires a high state of alert.

China’s National Health Commission had received reports of one confirmed case in Japan, one in South Korea and three in Thailand by Tuesday midnight, Li said.

In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed on Tuesday local time the first case in the country — a Washington state resident, according to Politico, a news website.

Gao Fu, head of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said there is no evidence so far showing that a super-spreader, or a highly contagious virus, has emerged.

He added that, based on current evidence, the virus originated from wild animals sold at a seafood market in Wuhan.

Emergency response mechanism activated

In Hubei, the provincial government announced early on Wednesday that it had activated its emergency public health response mechanism to effectively prevent the spread of the virus.

Strict quarantine measures are being taken on all suspected and confirmed cases, people in close contact with the cases and those who have been suspected of viral exposure, it said.

Body temperature testing points will be set up at all airports, railway stations and ports, and all passengers will be subject to testing before boarding. Suspected passengers will be sent to designated medical institutions, according to the announcement.

Local authorities will strictly control the number of outbound activities such as conferences, tours and visits, and large gatherings are banned.

Measures will also be taken to prevent the spread of the virus through public transport, and prevent sources of it from entering schools, according to the announcement.

Wuhan authorities announced on Wednesday that all local tourism agencies, including their branches outside the city, will suspend business and will not organize tours until Feb 8. All tours scheduled to start after Jan 30 will be canceled.

The city government has also called for residents not to leave Wuhan and outsiders not to enter the city if there’s no particular need, to reduce the risk of the virus spreading further.

Zhou Lihua in Wuhan and Xinhua contributed to this story.

“We have close contact with WHO and shared the genetic sequence of the new coronavirus as soon as possible, Li Bin, deputy director of the commission, said at a news conference at the State Council Information Office.

Chinese health experts have held four meetings with experts from WHO and the country has invited WHO experts to visit Wuhan, Hubei province, to learn about the situation of the epidemic, he said.

The commission also has close communication with health authorities in Thailand, Japan, South Korea and the United States and their embassies in China, Li said.

“We have shared epidemic information with them and helped confirming suspected and diagnosed cases.”

Apart from sharing epidemic information, the commission has invited experts from Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan to visit medical facilities in Wuhan and offered free diagnostic kits to Hong Kong and Macao, he added.