Did Olympic Athletes Need To Be Vaccinated? No — And Now More Are Testing Positive For Covid-19.
Topline
More than 11,000 athletes will take part in the Tokyo Olympics starting this week, but while most participants will be vaccinated against Covid-19, the shots have not been required, fueling public health concerns and the likelihood that more will have to withdraw—like U.S. tennis star Coco Gauff—when they test positive.
U.S. tennis player Coco Gauff at the Wimbledon Tennis Championships in London on June 29.
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Key Facts
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) states in its playbook for the Olympics that athletes “will not be required to have received a vaccine in order to participate” though they are “encourage[d],” and the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee (USPOC) has not imposed any additional restrictions for U.S. team members.
Despite the uneven distribution of Covid-19 vaccines around the world, Olympic athletes did have wider access to the shot: The IOC partnered with Pfizer/BioNTech and the Chinese Olympic Committee to distribute donated vaccine doses to Olympic participants, and a number of countries explicitly prioritized Olympic athletes in their vaccine rollout to ensure they were inoculated on time.
The IOC told Forbes in an email their vaccination programs have been “very successful” but did not disclose the exact amount of vaccines that were donated, and the donations would not apply to athletes in countries where those vaccines are not yet authorized, or to teenage athletes who are not approved to receive the Covid-19 vaccine in their countries yet.
Some Olympic athletes have cited concerns about vaccine side effects interfering with their Olympic training, while others have refused it “who don’t believe that the virus exists and that it’s a global conspiracy and that the vaccine is a tracking device,” USPOC chief medical officer Jonathan Finnoff told the New York Times.
Finnoff told the Times and USA Today the USPOC has been educating athletes on vaccinations by offering webinars, making health experts available and providing literature to dispel myths about the vaccine.
Big Number
More than 80%. That’s the percentage of Olympic and Paralympic athletes that are estimated to be vaccinated against Covid-19, the IOC projected in June. That number may now be higher, as the IOC told Forbes in an email Monday night it has “received assurances” that at least 85% of delegation members from countries’ National Olympics Committees have been vaccinated. Individual sports teams may also have higher vaccination rates: the Washington Post reported in June 90% of athletes on the U.S. Olympic swim team were vaccinated, for instance, while USA Today reports the U.S. men’s rugby team “collectively agree[d]…that vaccinations were an overall positive.”
Crucial Quote
“With the period going into Olympic trials, I didn’t want to risk any time out of the pool,” Andrew said on Fox Business last week about his decision not to get vaccinated, saying he believed getting the shot wasn’t “necessary.” “Going to the Games not only unvaccinated, but as an American, I’m representing my country in multiple ways and the freedoms we have to make a decision like that.”
Contra
Covid-19 vaccines are broadly protective against the coronavirus and are highly effective at preventing severe illness and death, including against the highly transmissible Delta variant now spreading worldwide. Breakthrough infections are possible if rare, however, meaning Olympic athletes may test positive for Covid-19—and have—even if they’re vaccinated. The Associated Press reported Monday U.S. women’s gymnastics alternate Kara Eaker tested positive for Covid-19 despite being fully vaccinated, though Eaker’s family told KMBC the 18-year-old gymnast is so far asymptomatic, and Czech volleyball player Ondřej Perušič also tested positive Monday despite being vaccinated.
Chief Critics
Public health experts have widely condemned the decision to move forward with the Olympics amid the Covid-19 pandemic, and several criticized the IOC’s playbook laying out its Olympic safety protocols—and lack of vaccine requirements—in a July article for the New England Journal of Medicine. “We believe the IOC’s determination to proceed with the Olympic Games is not informed by the best scientific evidence,” the experts, from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, the University of Minnesota and University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, wrote. “The IOC’s playbooks are not built on scientifically rigorous risk assessment, and they fail to consider the ways in which exposure occurs, the factors that contribute to exposure, and which participants may be at highest risk.”
Key Background
U.S. gymnast Eaker and Perušič became the latest Olympic athletes to test positive for Covid-19 Monday, following news Sunday that two South African athletes at the Olympic village and U.S. tennis player Coco Gauff had contracted the coronavirus. Other than Eaker, it is so far unclear if the other athletes were vaccinated against Covid-19. Six British athletes and two coaches are also now in isolation after coming into contact with someone infected with Covid-19 on their flight to Japan. According to Olympic organizers, 55 people affiliated with the Olympics had tested positive for Covid-19 as of Sunday, though only four were athletes. Stringent safety protocols are in place for athletes during the Tokyo Olympics in an effort not to spread the virus, including enhanced restrictions for participants coming from countries with significant outbreaks of the Delta variant.
Surprising Fact
Though the U.S. Olympic team is not requiring vaccinations for athletes, USA Track & Field has mandated the vaccine for its staff members accompanying the team to the summer games. USPOC has not yet responded to a request for comment on whether other U.S. teams have similar vaccine requirements in place.
Tangent
Athletes who are identified as close contacts of anyone who tests positive for Covid-19 may still be able to compete in the Olympics despite the games’ isolation requirements. According to the IOC’s playbook, close contacts—those who have spent at least 15 minutes with the infected person and been within a meter of them without a face mask—will be subject to additional requirements in order to compete, including daily negative PCR tests, quarantining in a private room and using dedicated vehicles and training facilities away from other athletes.
Further Reading
U.S. Olympic Gymnast One Of Growing Number Of Tokyo 2020 Athletes To Test Positive For Covid-19 (Forbes)
Tokyo Olympics Troubles: First Athletes Test Positive Inside Olympic Village (Forbes)
‘I’m definitely going to get that’: Vaccines not required, most USOPC athletes still eager for shots (USA Today)
I.O.C. Offers Vaccine to All Tokyo Games Participants (New York Times)
Tokyo’s Olympic Village will be very vaccinated (Vox)
*** This article has been archived for your research. The original version from Forbes can be found here ***
