As the coronavirus outbreak sends people on city-wide quests to find a store stocking face masks, the government and manufacturers have seemingly failed in their response to the crisis, fueling concern that shortages will continue for some time."That was not an announcement from us," a source from an industry body, the Japan Hygiene Products Industry Association, said recently, referring to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's pledge to ensure 600 million masks will be made available in Japan every month.In fiscal 2018 through March last year, domestic companies produced 1.1 billion masks and import…READ FULL ARTICLE
