In a decision that has seemed inevitable for some time now as the world deals with the COVID-19 pandemic, it has been announced that the 2020 Summer Olympics in Japan has been postponed.
International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach and Japanese Prime Minster Abe Shinzo released a joint statement on Tuesday making this announcement.
“In the present circumstances and based on the information provided by the WHO today, the IOC President and the Prime Minister of Japan have concluded that the Games of the XXXII Olympiad in Tokyo must be rescheduled to a date beyond 2020 but not later than summer 2021, to safeguard the health of the athletes, everybody involved in the Olympic Games and the international community,” the statement read.
It goes without saying that the acceleration of the coronavirus in North America and Europe played a major role in this decision. Both continents have seen other sports suspend or outright cancel seasons. There’s no way that the Olympics could have gone on as planned with world-wide cases currently standing at 375,000.
This did not make it any easier for the sports world to accept that one of the year’s biggest events will not go on as planned. Others understood fully the gravity of the situation and that sports must continue to take a back seat.