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02/25 11:23 CST IOC member casts doubt on postponing or moving Tokyo Games
IOC member casts doubt on postponing or moving Tokyo Games
By STEPHEN WADE
AP Sports Writer
TOKYO (AP) --- A senior member of the International Olympic Committee said
Tuesday that if it proves too dangerous to hold the Olympics in Tokyo this
summer because of the coronavirus outbreak, organizers are more likely to
cancel it altogether than to postpone or move it.
Dick Pound, a former Canadian swimming champion who has been on the IOC since
1978, making him its longest-serving member, estimated there is a three-month
window --- perhaps a two-month one --- to decide the fate of the Tokyo
Olympics, meaning a decision could be put off until late May.
"In and around that time, I'd say folks are going to have to ask: ?Is this
under sufficient control that we can be confident about going to Tokyo or
not?'" he said in an exclusive interview with The Associated Press.
As the games draw near, he said, "a lot of things have to start happening.
You've got to start ramping up your security, your food, the Olympic Village,
the hotels. The media folks will be in there building their studios."
If the IOC decides the games cannot go forward as scheduled in Tokyo, "you're
probably looking at a cancellation," he said.
The viral outbreak that began in China two months ago has infected more than
80,000 people globally and killed over 2,700, the vast majority of them in
China. But the virus has gained a foothold in South Korea, the Middle East and
Europe, raising fears of a pandemic. Japan itself has reported four deaths.
Pound encouraged athletes to keep training. About 11,000 are expected for the
Olympics, which open July 24, and 4,400 are bound for the Paralympics, which
open Aug. 25.
"As far as we all know, you're going to be in Tokyo," Pound said. "All
indications are at this stage that it will be business as usual. So keep
focused on your sport and be sure that the IOC is not going to send you into a
pandemic situation."
The modern Olympics, which date to 1896, have been canceled only during
wartime. The Olympics in 1940 were supposed to be in Tokyo but were called off
because of Japan's war with China and World War II. The Rio Games in Brazil
went on as scheduled in 2016 despite the outbreak of the Zika virus.
Pound repeated the IOC's stance --- that it is relying on consultations with
the World Health Organization, a United Nations body, to make any move.
As for the possibility of postponement, he said: "You just don't postpone
something on the size and scale of the Olympics. There's so many moving parts,
so many countries and different seasons, and competitive seasons, and
television seasons. You can't just say, `We'll do it in October.'"
Pound said moving to another city also seems unlikely "because there are few
places in the world that could think of gearing up facilities in that short
time to put something on."
London mayoral candidate Shaun Bailey has suggested the British capital as an
alternative. Tokyo Gov. Yuriko Koike suggested the offer was an attempt to use
the virus for political purposes.
Pound said he would not favor a scattering of Olympic events to other places
around the world because that wouldn't "constitute an Olympic Games. You'd end
up with a series of world championships." He also said it would be extremely
difficult to spread around the various sports over a 17-day period with only a
few months' notice.
Holding the Olympics in Tokyo but postponing them by a few months would be
unlikely to satisfy North American broadcasters, whose schedules are full in
the fall with American pro football, college football, European soccer,
basketball, baseball and ice hockey. Other world broadcasters also have jammed
schedules.
"It would be tough to get the kind of blanket coverage that people expect
around the Olympic Games," Pound said.
He also cast doubt on the possibility of a one-year delay. Japan is officially
spending $12.6 billion to organize the Olympics, although a national audit
board says the country is spending twice that much.
"You have to ask if you can hold the bubble together for an extra year," Pound
said. "Then, of course, you have to fit all of this into the entire
international sports schedule."
Pound said the IOC has been building up an emergency fund, reported to be about
$1 billion, for unforeseen circumstances to help the IOC and the international
sports federations that depend on income from the IOC. About 73% of the IOC's
$5.7 billion income in a four-year Olympic cycle comes from broadcast rights.
"It's not an insurable risk, and it's not one that can be attributed to one or
the other of the parties," he said. "So everybody takes their lumps. There
would be a lack of revenue on the Olympic movement side."
Pound said the future of the Tokyo Games is largely out of the IOC's hands and
depends on the course the virus takes.
"If it gets to be something like the Spanish flu," Pound said, referring to the
deadly pandemic early in the 20th century that killed millions, "at that level
of lethality, then everybody's got to take their medicine."
___
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