Official We Want the Tokyo Olympics Thread (How Can We Make Them Happen Safely?)

Precious Roy wrote:

In order to have a safe Olympic Games, you would have to make huge changes. No opening/closing ceremonies. No spectators. The games would have to be stretched out over a a much longer time period to limit the number of athletes in the Olympic Village housing at any one time.

Athletes would have to quarantine for 14 days if they were not vaccinated (assuming that the current crop of vaccines provide effective sterilizing immunity). Each even would need to have its own bubble.

1) If the athletes are all tested and it's held outdoors I don't see why you couldn't have an opening ceremony. I think the plan was to have a scaled back opening ceremony.

2) And I'm not against bubbles, but the 14 day bubble isn't the only way to do it. NFL is about to have it's Super Bowl and there is no bubble. I probably just jinxed it and Tom Brady is going to get Covid now, but I think they do shorter quarantines with more testing if someone is exposed. Maybe they could share what they do. They also know how to deal with false positives which happen with any test (my dad had one).

I wonder what the math is if 100,000 people fly to Japan for the Olympics and are all tested on arrival, etc.

[/quote]

1) If the athletes are all tested and it's held outdoors I don't see why you couldn't have an opening ceremony. I think the plan was to have a scaled back opening ceremony.

.[/quote]

The problem is not as much the ceremony as it is having everyone in the Olympic village at the same time. In order to manage the bubbles needed to stay safe, you would need to stagger out the game as much as possible. You also need extra room to quarantine people. Dumping everyone into Tokyo at the beginning of the games is just not workable.

Staggering out the games over a longer period of time is actually something that might be good regardless of the pandemic. It would give lesser known sports more visibility and keep costs down for hosts by reducing the number of venues needed.

wejo wrote:

DanM wrote:

Would it not be wiser to wait until 2022 ? The pageantry of the Olympics with the spectacle of the opening and closing ceremonies is part of what makes the Olympics different from other sporting events. There is precedent for the Olympics being held 2 years apart when the Winter Games changed their schedule in the early 1990s.

Summer Olympics in Japan 2022, Winter Olympics in China, 2023, then the regular schedule can continue starting in 2024.

I meant to advise people to not post in this thread that they think the Games shouldn't be held. If you think that feel free to start another thread on that. I'm not out to squelch opposing views, but I want threads to be on topic.

As for delaying to 2022, I think it's better than cancelling but the organizers have said it's not an option.

Target your "We want the Olympics" message to Japan's elderly. The 65-and-over age group is 29% of the population in Japan (36 Million out of 126 Million) and they are the people at greatest risk of death and serious illness from COVID.

wejo wrote:

I've written an editorial on why I think we should have the Olympics this year

I know a lot of you all agree with me.

Are you sure about this?

wejo wrote:

DanM wrote:

Would it not be wiser to wait until 2022 ? The pageantry of the Olympics with the spectacle of the opening and closing ceremonies is part of what makes the Olympics different from other sporting events. There is precedent for the Olympics being held 2 years apart when the Winter Games changed their schedule in the early 1990s.

Summer Olympics in Japan 2022, Winter Olympics in China, 2023, then the regular schedule can continue starting in 2024.

I meant to advise people to not post in this thread that they think the Games shouldn't be held.

Free speech

They should hold it as a virtual event.

1) Limit or entirely eliminate foreign fans from attending.

2) Indoor arenas = no fans

3) Outdoor stadiums no more than 1/3 full...mandatory masks

DanM wrote:

Target your "We want the Olympics" message to Japan's elderly. The 65-and-over age group is 29% of the population in Japan (36 Million out of 126 Million) and they are the people at greatest risk of death and serious illness from COVID.

1) I'm hoping to that the people who come to the Olympics do not spread a lot of covid. Stringent testing requirements could be put in place. We know flying is relatively safe in terms of not spreading covid as it is perhaps the easiest thing to track. And if tons of cases were spreading on planed we would be hearing about it.

But yes theoretically someone could be asymptomatic and bring Covid into Japan . But testing on both ends would likely limit this.

Tourists could be put to the same requirements, etc or be required to put down a deposit that they will forfeit if they test positive while in Japan, etc.

Even in light of #1,

2) I know Japanese are more suspicious of the vaccine than Americans but the elderly could get vaccinated.

3) If you wanted to have an Olympic Games where the athletes just competed and interacted with themselves and not the Japanese public you could do that. Then the old people would not have to worry about getting COVID from the foreigners.

4) If you're worried about Japanese people themselves attending events and spreading Covid within the population, I'd argue that's more of a personal liberty choice if such gatherings were allowed. But if you were elderly or high-risk you could make the choice to avoid attending the Games. It's like the Green Bay Packers had a game this weekend and I saw that some 80+ year old lady was so excited to get a ticket. Obviously if she was super concerned about Covid she could choose not to go.

I posted this in the opposing “We don’t want the Olympics” thread but I figure it’s equally relevant here:

I’m not going to offer an opinion on whether the Olympics should be held this year or not.

I think that World Athletics should begin looking into a contingency plan of holding a global athletics (T&F) championship this year. The dramatically reduced number of athletes would begin to make it safer in and of itself. Then you could take certain measures to reduce the risk of it becoming a Covid spreading event:

-Mandate negative results on at least two Covid tests before traveling, as well as health-screening before entering the athletes’ village or “bubble”...once inside, athletes must remain in the bubble or they will not be allowed to re-enter

-Limit number of coaches, officials and other personnel, all of whom must adhere to the same travel and admittance protocols

-No fans in the stadium...just the way it’s got to be

-More stringent qualifying standards to reduce the number of athletes and concomitantly the duration of the Championships (i.e. fewer rounds)

-Strongly encourage wearing masks and social distancing at all times except for when competing, and discourage socializing with athletes from other countries or who are not sharing the same rooming quarters

Yeah, it doesn’t sound as fun as competing in an ordinary Olympics or World Championships, but if I were a world class athlete I would still 100% want the opportunity to compete for a global gold medal even under these conditions.

...

Yes, I’ve always enjoyed the spectacle and the celebratory feel of the opening ceremonies, and I’ve always enjoyed flipping from discipline to discipline (I remember watching the astonishing, gold medal winning trampoline routine executed by China’s Dong Dong), but what I really love most about the Olympics and what would pain me to miss is track and field and the marathon.

wejo wrote:

4) If you're worried about Japanese people themselves attending events and spreading Covid within the population, I'd argue that's more of a personal liberty choice if such gatherings were allowed. But if you were elderly or high-risk you could make the choice to avoid attending the Games. It's like the Green Bay Packers had a game this weekend and I saw that some 80+ year old lady was so excited to get a ticket. Obviously if she was super concerned about Covid she could choose not to go.

No visitors except athletes and coaches. Even USATF officials don't get to fly in and waste money for once.

Mandatory 14 day quarantine with testing daily. Positive test = 2 weeks quarantine and end of your olympics (you assume this risk).

Bubble around olympic village. Spectators only allowed to go to and from arenas.

Structure quarantining so athletes have SOME access to outdoor training. Allow athletes to arrive weeks before so they aren't competing straight out of quarantine.

Allow reduced density spectators maybe depending on case situation at time of games.

That would work, probably, but it's very $$$ for all involved and requires spending weeks quarantining before.

wejo wrote:

Maybe we could have a separate thread on holding them somewhere else but after talking to an Olympic insider I don't think they'd consider it. For example Walt Disney World has 30,000 hotel rooms just on property. They have tons of sports facilities. Florida is open for business. I think if you had the right attitude you could have it there. But then there is the fact Disney owns ABC not NBC, etc.

So much of this comes down to what you are willing to tolerate.

Maybe your initial thought and mine weren't so crazy after all. It is official. Florida says they will hos the Games.

I think this only helps the Games happen this year. I'm sure some will say Florida has done such a worse job than covid than Japan, etc but the offer isn't going to make the Olympics less likely to happen.

Yes I'm basically in the don't have Olympics camp, sorry if that was unclear.

You're right, there are different reasons why different countries are struggling with covid. I'm not very familiar with Peru's situation but it sounds like they have a ton of poor people who can't afford to not work and who aren't covered by the social safety net. So their lockdown can't be a real lockdown. That's sad.

One counter-argument might be, what if we use the same logic about doping? "Oh, X is a poor country, they can't afford doping infrastructure and the athletes aren't always on the books. But that doesn't mean we should exclude them from the Olympics right?" Of course you say no, ban the country. Maybe not the best example because covid is out of the hands of the Athletics Federations, but your argument here isn't "they shouldn't be banned" but rather "there are too many countries we would have to ban".

I've thought about this a bit more and I had a few more points I wanted to make:

1. Look at how much of a disaster the Australian Open (tennis) has been. The athletes are going nuts, trapped in their hotels, they're outraged, etc etc. The Australian Open has a couple hundred players this year and they're mostly from wealthy countries. Not anywhere close to the number and variety of athletes at the Olympics.

2. I already mentioned how it's unfair to the Japanese people, I think it's also unfair to athletes who feel like they would be risking their lives in going. If they do have an Olympics and an athlete chooses not to participate over virus fears, they risk their career. If they don't have an Olympics then the sponsors will have to be a little bit more understanding towards everyone.

3. I'm very much against letting entertainers get the vaccine before more important groups of people. This feels like line-cutting to me. A *lot* of people desperately want that vaccine. People are offering bribes and trying to do all sorts of crazy things to get it. Athletes and entertainers are NOT as important as essential workers. I was offered the vaccine a month ago because I work at a hospital and I'm doing covid research. But I am able to do my work from home, so I discussed this with them and decided to pass for now and let them give my dose to the next person. It was a really difficult decision because like everyone else I do selfishly want this to be over for myself. But I'm also trying to do what's best for our society. And I don't think the best thing for our society would be to give the next doses to entertainers instead of nurses, essential workers, or old people.

Bottom line, the Olympics are not that important. Athletes are not that important. And I think this pressure to behave as if it's business as usual in the sports world is dangerous.

We can have the olympics just fine by moving them to a non-lockdown country like Belarus.

Yes, you might catch a certain disease twice as deadly as flu. Your call if you still wanna go. Jump on that plane to Minsk!

David S wrote:

I think it's also unfair to athletes who feel like they would be risking their lives in going. If they do have an Olympics and an athlete chooses not to participate over virus fears, they risk their career. If they don't have an Olympics then ...

If they don't have an Olympics then they don't even have a career. This is a very bad argument.

I imagine the issue is the number of people coming in from the number of countries. The Olympics has a very diverse base of individuals (not just competitors but coaches, officials, volunteers, support staff and so on) who would be travelling in from all over the world. Imagine that on a map, every person's trajectory is a red line between their country and Japan. Shared facilities, shared rooms, shared cafeterias. It isn't really about the competition side as that is low risk.

Yo, Wejo, let the chips fall where they fall. We all want to see the Olympics happen but you have nothing to do with the science/medical/government world. You can't just posit that you think it's safe enough to happen. The blood can be on your hands. Have you been reading about runners who have gotten the virus? The comeback hasn't been easy & we're still trying to understand the full range of side effects.

Having people from across the world descend on the same place and compete with one another seems like a stretch. Maybe with no fans and what not but we have not seen sports be successful on this kind of a level. The NFL has been a nightmare and they just plowed through in the name of money. These leagues are also small potatoes in terms of size compared to the Olympics.

Maybe things change by the summer. We'll see how the vaccine distribution goes but individual countries are going to be ahead of others. 2022 seems more feasible. Things aren't normal right now. We don't have to pretend like they are.

wejo wrote:

[quote]DanM wrote:

4) If you're worried about Japanese people themselves attending events and spreading Covid within the population, I'd argue that's more of a personal liberty choice if such gatherings were allowed. But if you were elderly or high-risk you could make the choice to avoid attending the Games. It's like the Green Bay Packers had a game this weekend and I saw that some 80+ year old lady was so excited to get a ticket. Obviously if she was super concerned about Covid she could choose not to go.

Hey, folks, this is why good government needs to exist. Warped thinking like this/people can't just do what they're supposed to. Wejo -- you understand this kind of thinking is, in part, why the pandemic has been as bad as it's been in the US? Because people prioritize individual freedom over taking care of one another. God, we're so selfish in this country.

This is really how you're choosing to use your platform? This place is just becoming alt right breeding ground. You're doing real harm with your voice/reach.