Olympics on the verge of being cancelled

[NJDan 1,077]

28 minutes ago, Husker_Du said:

i had/have an all sports press credential and opted not to go. seems like a sh!t show. it would have been my first OLY. bummed about it but i'm not going to that with all the uncertainty. 

Are you vaccinated? if so, why not go?

 

[flyingcement 817]

35 minutes ago, Husker_Du said:

i had/have an all sports press credential and opted not to go. seems like a sh!t show. it would have been my first OLY. bummed about it but i'm not going to that with all the uncertainty. 

[headshuck 2,604]

i had/have an all sports press credential and opted not to go. seems like a sh!t show. it would have been my first OLY. bummed about it but i'm not going to that with all the uncertainty. 

Must have been a difficult decision. Not sure I’d go with sh!t show as a description of the Olympics but…

[Husker_Du 852]

they declared a state of emergence - everything in the city shuts down early.

what kind of access will you have? will there even be interviews / mixed zones allowed?

how many media members will be allowed in the arena? or will we be stuck in some room watching on monitors?

i'm in budapest rn and we had to get covid tests before we left, when we arrived, and before we leave. i can only imagine what you have to do in tokyo.

actually, no, i can't imagine. which is why i aint goin'

[TripNSweep 763]

Not like it'll spread since there aren't any spectators around to watch anyway. 

[GreatWhiteNorth 535]

It'll be good to keep the unvaccinated as far away as possible, that much we all know.

Edited July 21, 2021 by GreatWhiteNorth

[Shiraz123 829]

To my surprise the Olympics has already started. Some football matches are being played right now. Didn't know they did anything before the opening ceremony. 

[Uwwdoc 125]

1 hour ago, Shiraz123 said:

To my surprise the Olympics has already started. Some football matches are being played right now. Didn't know they did anything before the opening ceremony. 

Yeah this is always the case. Football starts 2 days before opening ceremony.

[klehner 734]

7 hours ago, TripNSweep said:

Not like it'll spread since there aren't any spectators around to watch anyway. 

The only people present are the athletes, right?

[TripNSweep 763]

19 minutes ago, klehner said:

The only people present are the athletes, right?

And affiliated types, employees, coaches, referees, camera operators if it's televised, etc.

[Ogalthorpe Haywood 399]

18 hours ago, MizzouGrad said:

Top sponsors are all pulling out at the last minute, COVID 'bubble' is a farce, and now top government officials openly questioning whether it will proceed. All while nearly 60 percent of the Japanese public wanted it cancelled weeks ago. 

We keep this up and we won't make it to wrestling. 

You did mean the Olympics on the verge of starting since they they began last night! I hope Cox sets his alarm to watch like the rest of us.

[headache 149]

Past Olympics in location with hot climates have been delayed until fall - Mexico City (1968) Oct. 12 - 27; Seoul (1988) - Sept. 17 - Oct. 2; Tokyo (1964) - Oct. 10 - 24. Apparently, NBC didn't want to lose $$$ moving it to the fall, so the heat and humidity (predicted to be very high) are going to be a huge problem.

I'd be surprised if this isn't a disaster.

[dman115 522]

Ahhhh...I miss the days when people talked about how horrible the US has done with Covid and the vaccine...I believe there was even talk about how much better Japan has done then us...good times...gooood times

[cu155 32]

2 minutes ago, dman115 said:

Ahhhh...I miss the days when people talked about how horrible the US has done with Covid and the vaccine...I believe there was even talk about how much better Japan has done then us...good times...gooood times

You mean Japan's 3800 new cases on July 20th out of a population of 126 million versus the US with 62,000 new cases on July 20th out of a population of 328 million?  Yes, the US is clearly doing a much better job...

[dman115 522]

3 minutes ago, cu155 said:

You mean Japan's 3800 new cases on July 20th out of a population of 126 million versus the US with 62,000 new cases on July 20th out of a population of 328 million?  Yes, the US is clearly doing a much better job...

Oh boy...here we go.  <eye roll>  Did you even read what pa in taiwan wrote??

How about this...who would rather go to watch the Olympics in Japan, or if it was in the US right now?

[DocBZ 194]

Olympics have already started FWIW...USWNT Soccer and Softball group stage played yesterday.

[uncle bernard 1,117]

10 hours ago, MizzouGrad said:

The reaction to the AZ vaccine is a prefect example of not understanding asymmetric risks.

Right. Almost all medicine we take has similar risks. Have you ever seen a pharmaceutical commercial? For example, hormonal birth control presents a much higher chance of blood clots than the vaccine (both are microscopically low though).

The main problem with the clots is that they were a specific type of clot that is made worse by the normal treatment. They figured this out really quick and it's not a big problem anymore. Any government reaction like not offering the vaccine has far more to do with public perception and misunderstanding than actual science.

Either way, we see the trade off for low vaccination. If this were happening in the states, not only would there be no risk of cancellation, but we'd have fans. Such a shame. Regardless of your personal stance on the vaccine, I'm happy enough people got it that we could get back to normal (for the most part).

 

[uncle bernard 1,117]

48 minutes ago, dman115 said:

Ahhhh...I miss the days when people talked about how horrible the US has done with Covid and the vaccine...I believe there was even talk about how much better Japan has done then us...good times...gooood times

Lol, well tbf they were doing a better job pre-vaccine. If they had taken it, they would have gotten out of it much better than we did overall. Shot themselves in the foot at the finish line. But yes, glad things are doing much better around here. 

[dman115 522]

42 minutes ago, uncle bernard said:

Lol, well tbf they were doing a better job pre-vaccine. If they had taken it, they would have gotten out of it much better than we did overall. Shot themselves in the foot at the finish line. But yes, glad things are doing much better around here. 

Very logical response.  And nothing I could aggressively disagree with.  My bigger point is how people flip flop on their opinions without looking at the whole picture from start to finish like you just did.  Probably shouldn't have even said anything as it will probably get out of hand and get another thread shut down...so my bad on that.

Sure hope the Olympics isn't a disaster and it goes off as best as it possibly can given the circumstances.

[uncle bernard 1,117]

17 minutes ago, dman115 said:

Very logical response.  And nothing I could aggressively disagree with.  My bigger point is how people flip flop on their opinions without looking at the whole picture from start to finish like you just did.  Probably shouldn't have even said anything as it will probably get out of hand and get another thread shut down...so my bad on that.

Sure hope the Olympics isn't a disaster and it goes off as best as it possibly can given the circumstances.

Yes, you're very right that people tend to respond to what's right in front of them, and it's hard to ask otherwise honestly. 

It's been an interesting look at how the social/material conditions on the ground in these countries had such a big effect on the response at different stages of the pandemic. The U.S. was far poorer suited to lockdowns and distancing because of a more individualistic culture/lack of social investment in a common good as well as an unprepared/decaying healthcare infrastructure that made dealing with the fallout from that especially bad. This led to worse results trying to contain the virus early than many places with stronger social bonds and/or prior experience dealing with pandemics like SARS. Now the situation has flipped. As pa in taiwan said, the longstanding vaccine skepticism left Japan vulnerable to a resurgence whereas the US has had much better results and is now returning to normal life.

In short, while I certainly didn't like the previous administration and would have done many things differently, there was always too much focus (or TDS) on him as a person when the reality was that the response was always going to be constrained by the actual conditions in this country that left us really vulnerable to a global pandemic and while things are better now under Biden, it's hard to imagine there would have been a significant difference without the vaccine.

 

[cu155 32]

1 hour ago, dman115 said:

Oh boy...here we go.  <eye roll>  Did you even read what pa in taiwan wrote??

How about this...who would rather go to watch the Olympics in Japan, or if it was in the US right now?

I'm not responding to him, I'm responding to yet another passive aggressive post by you, though I should know better than to bother.  And to answer your question, Japan.  Despite vaccine hesitancy in Japan, other cultural factors and response to the pandemic have resulted in a daily case load that is still lower on a per capita basis in Japan than in the US and given the 'individualist' nature of many people in the US there us a MUCH higher burden on the US to reach a state of herd immunity before we can say things are 'better'.  

[IronChef 1,099]

2 hours ago, headache said:

Past Olympics in location with hot climates have been delayed until fall - Mexico City (1968) Oct. 12 - 27; Seoul (1988) - Sept. 17 - Oct. 2; Tokyo (1964) - Oct. 10 - 24. Apparently, NBC didn't want to lose $$$ moving it to the fall, so the heat and humidity (predicted to be very high) are going to be a huge problem.

I'd be surprised if this isn't a disaster.

How will you decide it's been a disaster? The US Track & Field trials went off in Eugene a few weeks ago with extremely high heat. The schedule was adjusted, and athletes made accommodations for triple digit temperatures. It is a long way from "unusual heat and humidity" to "disaster." 

[headache 149]

30 minutes ago, IronChef said:

How will you decide it's been a disaster? The US Track & Field trials went off in Eugene a few weeks ago with extremely high heat. The schedule was adjusted, and athletes made accommodations for triple digit temperatures. It is a long way from "unusual heat and humidity" to "disaster." 

Just an opinion Chief, what do you care?

[IronChef 1,099]

You said it will be a disaster, and I want to know what you mean.

[dman115 522]

1 hour ago, cu155 said:

I'm not responding to him, I'm responding to yet another passive aggressive post by you, though I should know better than to bother.  And to answer your question, Japan.  Despite vaccine hesitancy in Japan, other cultural factors and response to the pandemic have resulted in a daily case load that is still lower on a per capita basis in Japan than in the US and given the 'individualist' nature of many people in the US there us a MUCH higher burden on the US to reach a state of herd immunity before we can say things are 'better'.  

Well...bye!