Local officials in Tokyo, Japan had to make the heartbreaking decision of cutting the buds of tens of thousands of roses in a popular flower park in Saitama in order to keep crowds away amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
与野公園バラ園
薔薇はもうシーズン終わりかけかな〜結構痛んでる感もあったけど、色んな薔薇が咲いてて見応えありました pic.twitter.com/8zDg0UFANr— 真央⚘? (@ma0h_xx) June 2, 2019
Workers of Yono Park had to sever the buds from 3,000 rose bushes this week as the area remained open to the public. The flowers, a total of 180 varieties of roses, were going to reach their peak bloom in the middle of May. The local government had already canceled the annual flower viewing festival this year but needed to make sure that they did everything that could to help keep everyone at home.
“It’s very painful, but we decided to take action after looking at the situation in other cities,” a local official told the Mainichi newspaper.
Another park in Sakura, Tokyo also had to cut 100,000 tulip stems after visitors swarmed the park at the time they were in full bloom. “It became a mass gathering, so we had no choice but to make the decision to cut the flowers,” a local tourism official told Reuters. The tulips were then donated to local kindergartens.
As of writing, Japan has 12,429 confirmed COVID-19 cases with 328 deaths and 2,408 recoveries.
(ALSO READ: Japan cancels tourist visas issued in the Philippines amid COVID-19 pandemic)
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