TV Asahi reported that according to analysis by an MHLW taskforce on COVID-19 cluster infections, a cluster that occurred at a hospital in Taito Ward, Tokyo, in which more than 100 people got infected and seven people died, may have been caused by a patient who got infected at a New Year’s party held on a Yakata houseboat in Tokyo in mid-January. The network said a patient who got infected with the virus during the houseboat event was admitted to the hospital on Jan. 18. Either this patient or another patient who returned from France is believed to have spread the virus to another patient in the hospital, who then spread the virus to medical practitioners and other patients.