With the Summer Olympics opening in Japan in just over a week, after being delayed for a year because of a worldwide pandemic that has yet to subside, Tokyo reported its highest number of new COVID-19 cases in almost six months on Wednesday.
In a related piece of news, which is also connected to that pesky global pandemic that has killed more than four million people, Olympians will be putting their own medals around their necks in order to protect against spreading the coronavirus, International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach revealed via a conference call from Tokyo.
“The medals will not be given around the neck,” Bach said. “They will be presented to the athlete on a tray and then the athlete will take the medal him or herself. It will be made sure that the person who will put the medal on tray will do so only with disinfected gloves so that the athlete can be sure that nobody touched them before.”
While it is great that IOC officials, who would typically present the medals, are being cautious, the degree to which they are doing so clearly brings into question whether the Olympics should be happening at all.
Taking place in front of no fans from home or abroad in a country where fewer than 20% of the population is fully vaccinated, the Olympics have the potential to be, for lack of a better term, a dumpster fire.
With no spectators, a non-existent torch relay on the Tokyo streets and self-serve medal ceremonies for all 339 events, the Summer Olympics are going to be very, very strange. And, if billions of dollars weren’t hanging in the balance, they would have already been canceled. As it stands, the Games will go on — even if, logically, they really, really shouldn’t.
“The most meaningful Games of our lifetime,” said Molly Solomon, executive producer and president of NBC Olympics Production. “We are all emerging from this pandemic, so many of the athletes it is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. We are confident we can confidently produce these Games.”
We’re not so confident they can play ’em …
As of now, the Olympics are set to open on July 23 during a state of emergency as COVID-19 cases continue to spike in Tokyo. Good times.
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