Apart from the masks, there are few signs here of the pandemic.

There has been no lock down, but don't be fooled.

Amid the glittering neon and jostling traffic for some, life amid the pandemic is becoming unbearable.

Since the pandemic began, this woman has tried to kill herself multiple times.

[From about this time last year I have been in and out of hospital many times, every month or so.]

[I tried many times, but I couldn't succeed, so now I guess I have given up trying to die.]

The young woman is now undergoing intensive counseling at this suicide prevention charity.

Its founder tells me since mid 2020 they have seen a dramatic increase in harrowing calls.

[People call saying I want to die, I want to disappear, I have no place to go.]

[A girl I talked to the other day said she is getting sexually harassed by her father.]

[But because of Covid her father is not working so much and he is at home a lot, so there is no escape for her.]

In previous financial crises, such as the 2008 banking collapse, it has always been men, and particularly middle-aged men whose suicide rates have gone up dramatically.

But Covid seems to be completely different.

It is affecting young people, and young women are being hit the hardest.

In central Tokyo, darkened and shuttered restaurants and bars tell part of the story.

Experts say the rise in young female suicide is being driven by economics.

This pattern of female suicide is very, very unusual that I have never seen this much increase in my past career as a researcher on this topic.

The number of job losses among non permanent jobs are just so, so large, during over the last 6, 8 months,

Japan has been quite successful at controlling the Covid pandemic.

But in the year since the virus arrived here more women have died from suicide have died from the virus itself.

Rupert Wingfield Hayes, BBC News in Tokyo.