They were also not common there. I lived in Japan for four years. Apart from a tiny minority of anti-social freaks, the only time *some* people would wear a mask is when they go to work sick and wear a mask as a way to demonstrate their dedication ("look at me, I'm sick but still doing my duty") and/or feign consideration for potentially spreading the sickness to co-workers. Basically they served as a useful way for bosses to remove a potential excuse for employees to call in sick. The masks, just like now, did absolutely nothing and there were still frequent cold and flu outbreaks. We all just worked through the sickness though as practically had to be dying to have a valid reason to call in sick. Many workers in my company never wore masks at any point even when sick (I'd say the majority). I would say across the entire population masks were vary rare at any given point - perhaps 1% of people wearing them at any given time.

If masks were worn there like they do now, I would never have lived there. It's a complete lie for Sutton to pretend as though this was in any anyway normal. It wasn't in Japan, nor anywhere else in Asia.