Chie Matsuda learned from a morning TV show here on Wednesday that passengers on U.S. airplanes had just been allowed to take off their masks.
It was a moment of celebration for some Americans, but Ms. Matsuda didn’t like the sound of it. “I’d be uncomfortable if the person next to me on the plane was unmasked," said the 64-year-old retiree as she ate a sandwich outside a Tokyo shopping mall. “We haven’t figured out yet how we could live with the coronavirus.
At this phase, we’d better take a more conservative approach." Pictures of maskless Americans packing sports stadiums, attending business meetings and now riding on airplanes look like they come from another planet for people in much of Asia, where masking is nearly universal and likely to stay that way for some time.
Japan in particular offers a counterpart to the U.S. trend: Mask requests are generally voluntary, yet compliance is widespread. “I believe it’s a product of peer pressure," said 22-year-old college student Ryo Takahashi, who was wearing a cloth mask Wednesday as he waited in line at a McDonald’s restaurant.