Japan’s Shinzo Abe Says Tokyo Olympics ‘Impossible’ If Pandemic Isn’t Contained

Though the Tokyo Olympics have been postponed to the year 2021, comments from officials this week have cast even those dates into doubt. Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said this week that hosting the Olympics next year would be “impossible” unless the coronavirus pandemic is under control by next year.

NPR reports that Abe was addressing an opposition lawmaker in parliament when he made the comments.

“It would be impossible to hold the Games in such a complete form unless the coronavirus pandemic is contained,” Abe said. He told Japan to “brace for a protracted battle,” and that the Olympics “must be held in a way that shows the world has won its battle against the coronavirus pandemic.”

That comes a day after Japanese Medical Association head Yoshitake Yokokura said the Olympics would have to be canceled if a vaccine for the coronavirus is not found.

While neither of those comments should come as a shock, they are a sobering reminder that any and all plans to return to normalcy are dependent on some key factors in the pandemic – whether the novel 2019 coronavirus and related COVID-19 cases start to fall, and whether a vaccine for the virus can be created and distributed.

The statements from the two Japanese officials also imply that while the 2020 Olympics were able to be postponed by one year, the host nation appears much more likely to cancel the Olympics than postpone them even further into the future if the pandemic isn’t settling down by next year.

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Ladyvoldisser
3 years ago

Hey Abe does not lie! Listen to his wisdom. The olympics in Tokyo are doomed – Bring on 2024!

Tokyo2020Supporter
Reply to  Ladyvoldisser
3 years ago

Well, that’s just super uplifting. Love your positivity.

Corn Pop
3 years ago

There are so many things that have to fall in place . Basically things that were there e.g. the ability of nations to fund their teams & the logistics to prepare ,send ,accommodate those teams have gone.

IOC & other instruments of power have got to be mindful of Japan & what they want . Japan is very sensitive to bad manners & angry words & demands . This goes for comments on sports forums too .

About Jared Anderson

Jared Anderson

Jared Anderson swam for nearly twenty years. Then, Jared Anderson stopped swimming and started writing about swimming. He's not sick of swimming yet. Swimming might be sick of him, though. Jared was a YMCA and high school swimmer in northern Minnesota, and spent his college years swimming breaststroke and occasionally pretending …

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