Tokyo seeks travel curbs as new infections exceed 100 for third day

Tokyo confirmed 131 new COVID-19 cases on Saturday, the largest daily increase in two months.

Tokyo government data indicated that young people in their 20s and 30s accounted for around 80 percent of the new cases, in line with a recent trend.

Tokyo confirmed 124 and 107 new cases separately on Friday and Thursday, partly due to increased testing among night-life workers in its Shinjuku and Ikebukuro districts. 

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said on Friday that the government was not planning to reintroduce a state of emergency. Curbs on movement pushed the world's third-biggest economy into a recession in the first quarter, with a deeper contraction expected in the April-June period.

The number of COVID-19 cases in Japan as of Saturday reached 19,411 and the death toll rose to 977, according to the latest data from Johns Hopkins University. 

(With input from agencies)