Thought of the Day - July 19 2021 - Tokyo 2020, Let the Games Begin

Headlines read "Coronavirus outbreaks involving Olympic teams in Japan have turned small-town hotels into facilities on the frontline of the pandemic battle." and "Health experts and hotel staff say the outbreaks underscore the risks of holding the world’s largest sports event during the middle of a global pandemic in a largely unvaccinated country." Hotel operators, who ramped up services anticipating the Olympics last year, are now getting slammed again as locals are making sure to stay away to avoid infection by the international Olympic entourage.

Tokyo 2020 'playbooks' for athletes and sports federations call for attendees to physically distance themselves from others, to wear masks, and to get tested daily! Those 'playbooks' are "working and being enforced", according to the IOC President Thomas Bach, who also said last week there was “zero” risk of Games participants infecting residents (of course, he is the same dude who has been working his butt off to make sure that the Olympics went ahead no matter the cost, and that inadvertently referring to the Japanese people as “Chinese” at his first public appearance in Japan.)

Since we last covered the run-up to the Olympics ( Thought of the Day - April 26 2021 - The Tokyo Olympics ) some 56,000 people have arrived in Japan, among them:

• Over 60 infections have been reported across nine teams;

• Outbreaks among athletes include members of Olympic delegations from Uganda, Serbia, South Africa, Czech Republic and Israel;

• A member of the Nigerian team, who is not an athlete, tested positive last Thursday and was hospitalized on Friday, the first case to get that serious;

• Forty-nine members of Brazil’s judo team are being kept in isolation after eight COVID-19 cases were discovered among the staff at a hotel where they are staying in Hamamatsu, southwest of Tokyo;

• Ryu Seung-min arrived from South Korea yesterday and became the first IOC member to test positive.

While Japan's four waves have been minimal compared to Canada's three, their fifth wave is now ramping up.

Most people in Japan think the Olympics should not go ahead, largely as only 20% are fully vaccinated. The opening ceremonies will kick off at the end of the week, against the backdrop that the host city, Tokyo, is now reporting its highest daily tally of new COVID-19 infections since late January.

At least there will be no spectators for the Games. Thus, hopefully, the Olympics will fare better than the aftermath of Euro 2020 where analysts in the UK are suggesting that England's run for the final, triggered (directly and indirectly) about a million new COVID-19 cases in the UK alone.

Only time will tell.

Cheers

Cliff