The spectators are invisible in the stadium, you can’t hear the applause, only the athletes are fighting in solitude …… Sadly, this will be the basic scenario for the upcoming Tokyo Summer Olympics. Bad luck, the 2020 Tokyo Olympics was forced to postpone to 2021 due to the rampant New Crown epidemic, however the epidemic has not dispersed so far, Japan’s Olympic Minister Marukawa Juyo announced on the 8th that the Tokyo Summer Olympics from July 23-August 8 will basically not be open to spectators. The decision of the Japanese authorities has instantly shattered the Olympic dreams of many spectators.
Unfortunately, just as the opening of the Tokyo Summer Olympics was approaching, the situation of the New Crown epidemic in Tokyo took a sudden turn for the worse, and Minister Marukawa Juyo announced on Thursday that “all venues in Tokyo will be closed to spectators”.
This is certainly a sad news for many Olympic fans. Most of the venues for the East Olympic Games are located in Tokyo, and those in Chiba, Saitama and Kanagawa prefectures, which are close to Tokyo, will also be closed to spectators. The games scheduled to be held in other areas, including Fukushima, Miyagi and Shizuoka, will be open to spectators, but in limited numbers.
Tokyo’s hard-fought bid to host the 2020 Summer Olympics was disrupted by the New Crown epidemic, forcing a one-year delay and forcing a decision in March not to host spectators from abroad, an unprecedented event in Olympic history.
The latest decision is based on the Japanese government’s announcement a few hours ago that from next Monday until August 22, Tokyo is back in a state of emergency prevention. The summer Olympics are covered in full by the state of emergency order. Health authorities announced that the number of confirmed cases in Tokyo in the last 24 hours was 896, the highest since mid-May. The highly infectious Indian variant of the virus now accounts for 30 percent of all infections in Japan. According to statistics, about 14,900 people have died from the new coronavirus throughout Japan since the beginning of last year.
Tokyo Organizing Committee Chairman Seiji Hashimoto said, “The Tokyo Olympics should be a rare and wonderful opportunity to feel the glamour of competition in a crowded stadium, but we are faced with the rapidly spreading New Coronavirus. It is a great pity that we are forced to organize such a restricted Olympics”. Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike, who has been under great pressure, said she was “distressed” by the authorities’ final decision, but urged spectators to watch the games “safely” at home.
In June, the Tokyo Organizing Committee decided to allow the venue to accommodate 50 percent of national spectators, with the maximum number of people limited to less than 10,000. But it was forewarned at the time that if the epidemic turned bad, the restrictions could be tightened at any time until spectators were excluded. The worst-case scenario for spectators finally happened.
A 54-year-old Japanese man who had been looking forward to going to the main event in Tokyo to cheer on the athletes was hit with a bucket of cold water by the authorities’ decision. He said he was hoping to win a lottery after the organizing committee announced that attendance would be capped at 10,000, “and now my Olympic dream is broken,” he told reporters sadly. Another gentleman planning to watch the triathlon criticized the government, saying that if people were vaccinated early, as the U.S. and other countries have done, everyone could safely participate in such a rare event that would not happen several times in a lifetime. Vaccination in Japan has been accelerated since May, and only about fifteen percent of the population has completed the vaccination so far.
The Olympic Torch Relay, which will begin on Friday, has been banned from crossing the main street, and the torch relay can only take place in places where there are no spectators.
It’s better to have the Olympics than to cancel them, that’s what French cyclist Guillaume Martin, who is competing in the Tokyo Olympics, thinks. That’s what French cyclist Guillaume Martin, a participant in the Tokyo Olympics, thought. When I think of the Olympics, I think of the spectators, the atmosphere, the supporters. Without the spectators, the atmosphere must have been strange, but the most important thing is that the Olympics took place and I’m glad I was there to compete.”
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