The Executive Board of the International Olympic Committee will meet in virtual session today with the staging of the games in Tokyo attracting substantial interest and commentary from around the world.
In the space of a few short days, there were rumours that the Japanese government were now lukewarm on the hosting, in line with a steep decline in public enthusiasm, then these were flatly denied.
The Olympic Federation of Ireland CEO, speaking at last week’s Sporing Year Ahead event reiterated that there was no reason to think the Games would not proceed as planned, even if in a pared-back version.
Vaccination has been a key narrative theme in recent days as well with Mo Farah lighting a fire under that yesterday telling TalkSport that “The key thing is to stay safe and see what the country can do. What they have said to us is basically everyone will be able to get Covid injections and after that, it’s less risk of spreading the disease, and then from there just see what happens and take one day at a time.”
Without referencing who ‘they’ were it is likely he was only talking off the top of his head but given the number of athletes involved and the potential lift in terms of wellbeing and morale that staging the games would deliver.
The entire Irish Olympic team will number around 70-80 athletes and maybe the same number of back up staff. That number of vaccine doses were discarded yesterday at one single group of nursing homes in the midlands because they had not been stored correctly.
Nobody would suggest that athletes get higher priority than any ‘at risk’ group but if they took up less than one per cent of the number being vaccinated within the general population at a time in May or June, then that could be seen in a different context.
Expanding that theory to Inter-County players in Gaelic Games or Rugby or soccer players makes the number much larger and the principle more difficult to justify.
The GAA dismissed any suggestion that they would raise this with NPhet, which is exactly the right thing to say. In England meanwhile, the idea is being raised that professional footballers should be vaccinated with the money currently being spent on continual testing being donated to the NHS. Sometimes the tone-deaf nature of the most privileged can be almost amusing to hear.
IOC President Thomas Bach set the tone for today’s meeting with commentary on the subject of vaccination.
“In all these conversations and initiatives, the IOC is guided by four principles: firstly, to organise the Olympic Games in a safe environment for everyone.”
“Secondly, vaccination priority should be given to vulnerable groups, nurses, medical doctors and everyone who is keeping our societies safe.”
“Thirdly, we encourage all the Olympic and Paralympic participants who are offered vaccination to accept it, also as an act of solidarity with the Japanese hosts and their fellow participants.”
“Fourthly, vaccination will not be obligatory.”
The Games are scheduled to get underway on July 23rd in Tokyo with the Paralympic Games following one month later.
Sport for Business Partners