Olympics, president of the organizing committee: if the epidemic continues, they will be canceled

2020-04-28T06:41:29.728Z

The Tokyo Olympics, postponed to 2021 due to the new coronavirus, will be canceled if the pandemic is not under control next year. Tokyo 2020 organizing committee chairman Yoshiro Mori said in an interview with the Japanese newspaper Nikkan Sports, explaining that the Games cannot be postponed beyond 2021 if the world is still struggling with Covid-19. "In this case," he said, "they will be canceled." The coronavirus pandemic has already forced the postponement of the Tokyo Olympics, which are currently scheduled to open on 23 July 2013. However, the chairman of the Tokyo 2020 organizing committee has warned that no further postponements are possible and that therefore if within the scheduled date for the Games will not be under control, the pandemic will be canceled. Mori replied with a categorical "No" to the question of whether the Olympics could be postponed further: "In that case they will be canceled," he said in an interview with the Japanese newspaper Nikkan Sports. Recalling therefore that previously the Games were canceled only in wartime, Mori compared the fight against the coronavirus to that against an "invisible enemy". But he also reassured that if the pandemic is successfully kept under control "we will keep the Olympics in peace next summer". On the same wavelength, the president of the association of Japanese doctors Yoshitake Yokokura who said that it will be "difficult" to be able to play the Olympics in Japan next year if a coronavirus vaccine is not found. "Unless an effective vaccine is developed, I think it will be difficult to play the Olympics next year," said Yokokura at a press conference in Tokyo. "I am not saying at the moment that they should not be held. The epidemic is not limited only to Japan - he continued - it is a worldwide problem".