Coronavirus: Three months to decide fate of Tokyo Olympics

IOC member says 'business as usual' at the moment and Games unlikely to be moved to another country

The Olympic flame lighting ceremony will be held on March 12, part of the countdown to the 2020 Games in Tokyo. AP

Dick Pound, the longest-serving member of the IOC, estimates there's a three-month window to decide the fate of the Tokyo Olympics, which is being threatened by the fast-spreading virus from China.

Pound did not sound alarmist. But he did speak frankly about the risks facing the Olympics, which open on July 24.

“You could certainly go to two months out if you had to,” Pound said, which would mean putting off a decision until late May and hoping the virus is under control. “A lot of things have to start happening.

"You've got to start ramping up your security, your food, the Olympic Village, the hotels, The media folks will be in there building their studios.”

And if it got to the point of not going ahead, Pound speculated “you're probably looking at a cancellation."

"This is the new war and you have to face it. In and around that time, I'd say folks are going to have to ask: ‘Is this under sufficient control that we can be confident about going to Tokyo, or not?'”

Pound encouraged athletes to keep training. About 11,000 are expected for the Olympics, and another 4,400 for the Paralympics, which opens on August 25.

“As far as we all know you're going to be in Tokyo,” Pound said. “All indications are at this stage that it will be business as usual. So keep focused on your sport and be sure that the IOC is not going to send you into a pandemic situation."

The modern Olympics dating from 1896 have only been cancelled during wartime, and faced boycotts in 1976 in Montreal, in 1980 in Moscow and 1984 in Los Angeles — all in Pound's memory.

The Olympics in 1940 were to be in Tokyo, but were called off because of Japan's war with China and World War II.

Pound called uncertainty a major problem and repeated the IOC's stance — that it's depending on consultations with the World Health Organization, a United Nations body, to make any move. So far, the Games are on.

“It's a big, big, big decision and you just can't take it until you have reliable facts on which to base it,” Pound said. He said whatever advice the IOC is now getting, "it doesn't call for cancellation or postponement of the Olympics. You just don't postpone something on the size and scale of the Olympics. There's so many moving parts, so many countries and different seasons, and competitive seasons, and television seasons. You can't just say, we'll do it in October.”

Pound said moving to another city seemed unlikely.

“To move the place is difficult because there are few places in the world that could think of gearing up facilities in that short time to put something on," he said.