© Copyright – 2021 – Athletics Illustrated
A new petition asking to cancel the Tokyo Olympic Games this summer has received over 300,000 signatures in two days.
The petition is addressed to International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach, as well as several government officials of Japan including Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga.
The person responsible for the petition is Kenji Utsunomiya, who was successful in having the Games postponed from 2020 to 2021.
Utsunomiya, who lost the federal election, wrote at Change.org, “In order to host the Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics in July, we must devote a large number of medical professionals, valuable resources such as medical facilities and medical equipment, and various other resources. However, as various organisations have already pointed out, there is no room in Tokyo and Japan as a whole. Where foreign spectators are restricted, the Olympics cause large-scale movement and contact of people. It is highly possible that the Olympics will exacerbate the infection situation.”
“The spread of new corona infections has not stopped at all not only in Tokyo but also in various parts of Japan and around the world to this day,” Utsunomiya wrote on Change.org. Vaccination, which started at the end of last year, is currently only widespread in some areas such as Europe and the United States and is not the decisive factor in preventing infection. Under these circumstances, it is extremely difficult to think that the Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics can be held safely in July this year. If held in this situation, the Olympics, which should be a “festival of peace,” would deviate significantly from that philosophy.”
Japan currently has one of the lowest rates of deaths per capita in the world at 86. The country has had a totall of 626,522 cases. Thirty-seven countries have had more.
