Reuters (August 1)
“As competitors battled for the podium on the third day of Olympic athletics on Sunday, it was Tokyo’s oppressive heat that perhaps dished out the most pain. Punishing conditions greeted athletes and officials as a trackside thermometer touched 40 degrees Celsius (104°F) and the humidity hovered around 60%, with sun beating down on an Olympic Stadium devoid of spectators due to COVID-19.”
Tags: 40 degrees Celsius, Athletes, Battled, Competitors, Conditions, COVID-19, Heat, Humidity, Officials, Olympics, Oppressive, Pain, Podium, Punishing, Spectators, Sun, Tokyo, Trackside
Washington Post (July 9)
“Tokyo’s newly rebuilt, 68,000-capacity National Stadium… will be empty throughout the Games, symbolizing the vast sums of money invested in these Olympics with little reward for the people of Japan or the country’s economy.” The spectator ban “highlights the government’s failure to get its vaccination program underway early enough to allow the Games to take place safely with fans.”
Tags: Economy, Empty, Failure, Government, Japan, Money, National Stadium, Olympics, Reward, Spectator ban, Tokyo, Vaccination program
Reuters (July 6)
The spectator ban on the opening ceremony is yet “another downgrade” for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, leaving its “pomp and public spectacle overshadowed by the coronavirus pandemic. Once promoted as an extravaganza to showcase Japan to the world, the Games appear in danger of taking place largely out of public view in a country closed to foreign tourists due to the pandemic.”
Tags: Ban, Closed, Coronavirus, Downgrade, Extravaganza, Foreign, Japan, Olympics, Opening ceremony, Overshadowed, Pandemic, Showcase, Spectacle, Spectator, Tokyo 2020
Washington Post (June 25)
The “Tokyo Olympics just got an important no-confidence vote—from Japan’s emperor.”
WARC (June 2)
“Sponsors that made a relatively sound bet on one of the major global sporting events could not have foreseen the pandemic. Now, with the games an increasingly controversial topic, sponsors are navigating negative public opinion.” As they “worry about the risks of sponsoring an event opposed by a majority of the country” and focus on avoiding negative exposure, some Olympic sponsors have given up on recouping their investments.
Tags: Controversial, Doubts, Exposure, Foreseen, Negative, Olympics, Pandemic, Public opinion, Risks, Sponsors, Sporting events, Worry
New York Times (May 25)
The U.S. State Department’s warning for Americans to avoid travelling to Japan due to the rising incidence of Covid-19 “has little practical effect, as Japan’s borders have been closed to most nonresident foreigners since the early months of the pandemic. But the warning is another blow for the Olympics, which are facing stiff opposition among the Japanese public over concerns that they could become a superspreader event as athletes and their entourages pour in from around the world.”
Tags: Athletes, Blow, Borders, Closed, COVID-19, Foreigners, Japan, Olympics, Opposition, Pandemic, State Department, Superspreader, U.S., Warning
New York Times (May 12)
“Pressing ahead with the Olympics risks drinking poison to quench our thirst for sport. The possibility of a superspreader catastrophe is not worth it for an optional sporting spectacle. It’s time to cancel the Tokyo Olympics.”
Tags: Cancel, Catastrophe, Olympics, Optional, Poison, Risks, Spectacle, Sport, Superspreader
The Guardian (April 12)
“Japan does not especially want to deliver the prestige of the first major global sporting event since the pandemic started to China.” Cancelling the Olympics would also place “billions of dollars at stake.” But “set against that are the lives that could be lost…. Undoubtedly, the cancellation of the Games would lead to disappointment and financial losses. However, these factors must be weighed against any risk that the Olympics could make the pandemic worse.”
Tags: Cancellation, China, Disappointment, Dollars, Global, Japan, Lives, Losses, Olympics, Pandemic, Prestige, Risk, Sporting event
Forbes (March 12)
“If the economics world handed out gold medals for unintended consequences, Japan’s Yoshiro Mori would be a shoo-in.” While “Japan has had more sexist-rant scandals,” none of those “occurred on the IOC’s watch—or during the social-media age.” The $25 billion being spent on the Olympics could, oddly, “be money well spent if the sexism scandal that felled Mori gets Japan to finally get serious about gender parity,” expanding the annual economy by the $750 billion that womenomics is expected to unleash.
Tags: Economics, Gender parity, Gold medals, IOC, Japan, Mori, Olympics, Scandals, Sexist, Social media, Unintended consequences, Womenomics
New York Times (November 20)
“Nine months after the I.O.C. and organizers in Tokyo agreed to postpone the 2020 Summer Games for one year, the level of uncertainty surrounding the event has barely waned, even as hopes for a successful Olympics have never been higher.”
Tags: 2020 Summer Games, I.O.C., Olympics, Postpone, Successful, Tokyo, Uncertainty
