Tokyo 2020 Reports 817 Positive COVID Cases Across Olympic and Paralympic Games

Tokyo 2020 organizers have released the data on the transmission of COVID during the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics, which have now concluded. The Games took their toll, as Japanese Prime Minister Yoshide Suga has announced his resignation due to public displeasure with his handling of the pandemic, which the Games no doubt played a role in. However, Japan’s government did keep its promise to the Japanese public, keeping the Olympic and Paralympic personnel away from the public.

The reported COVID numbers are (no pun intended) largely positive. Out of approximately 15,500 Olympic and Paralympic athletes at these Games, just 42 positive COVID tests were reported. Through September 4th (the most recent numbers), nearly 1 million daily tests (993,268) were administered to Tokyo 2020 accredited personnel, resulting in just 309 positives. That marks an infection rate among the accredited personnel of just 0.03%. Out of 77,000 Tokyo 2020 staff and volunteers, just 67 total positives were recorded.

In total, there were 817 COVID positives out of the nearly 100,000 people affiliated with the Olympic and Paralympic Games, for a total infection rate of just under 1%. Japan’s government was also administering tests at the Tokyo airports, and out of 54,214 such tests, there were 54 positives.

The numbers don’t look bad for those affiliated with the Olympic and Paralympic Games, however, the Tokyo public saw a giant increase in daily COVID cases during and after the Olympics. At the beginning of July, Tokyo was reporting less than 1,000 new cases a day. That spiked with the start of the Games, and continued to climb for 2 weeks after the conclusion of the Olympics. At it’s peak, Tokyo was experiencing 5,500 new cases a day. Since that peak, the daily cases have plummeted, with Tokyo reporting 968 new cases on September 6th.

Japan was slower to start their vaccination program than some other countries, but their catching up quickly. The latest numbers suggest that Japan is administering 1.1 million doses of vaccine every day, which mean’s their vaccinating nearly 1% of their 126 million population daily.