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The Cabinet Office reported that Japan’s preliminary seasonally adjusted real gross domestic product, or GDP, the sum of a nation’s goods and services, fell 7.8 percent quarter on quarter, reports AP.
The annual rate shows what the number would have been if continued for a year.
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Japanese media reported that the latest drop was the worst since World War II. But the Cabinet Office said comparable records began in 1980. The previous worst contraction was during the global financial crisis of 2009.
The world’s third largest economy was already ailing when the virus outbreak struck late last year.
The fallout has since gradually worsened both in COVID-19 cases and social distancing restrictions.
Until Monday morning, Japan had 56,074 confirmed coronavirus cases and 1,103 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University tally.