Norway won’t send athletes to Tokyo Olympics if COVID-19 situation does not improve

Earlier on Monday, Canada’s Olympic Committee made a similar statement

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Tokyo Olympics
Tokyo Olympics

Norwegian athletes during the ceremony to unveil the Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, 2016

Norway’s National Olympic Committee (NOC) will not send its athletes to the Tokyo Olympics if the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic is not under control by the time the Olympics are held, NOC President Berit Kjoll told reporters on Monday, cited by Reuters news agency.

“My clear advice to the board (of the Norwegian Olympics committee) is that you should ask not to send any athletes to the Paralympics or Olympics in Tokyo 2020 in light of the serious situation,” she said.

Earlier on Monday, Canada’s Olympic Committee made a similar statement. On Sunday, President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) Thomas Bach said that the IOC would make a decision in the next four weeks regarding the organization of the Tokyo Olympics.

The Tokyo Olympics are set to take place from July 24 to August 9.

A pneumonia outbreak caused by the COVID-19 virus (previously known as 2019-nCoV) was reported in China’s city of Wuhan, a large trade and industrial center with a population of 11 million, in late December 2019. Cases of the new coronavirus have also been reported in more than 150 countries and territories, among them Russia, which by now has documented 438 cases. The World Health Organization (WHO) says that the novel coronavirus cases across the globe have exceeded 320,000, with more than 14,000 deaths. WHO has officially described the situation with the novel coronavirus as a pandemic.

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