“Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike on Saturday cancelled all public viewing sites for the summer Olympics, diverting some venues to be COVID-19 vaccinations centres instead,” Reuters reports. “Foreign spectators are banned from attending the Games, delayed by a year due to the pandemic, but the government and Tokyo 2020 organisers have for months held off on deciding whether to allow Japanese spectators into the stadiums.”
“The ban on public viewing follows the metropolitan government’s decision this month to scrap plans for a public viewing site in Yoyogi Park in central Tokyo, converting the venue to a vaccination centre instead. Japanese medical experts said on Friday that banning spectators at the Olympics was the least risky option for going ahead with the event, while floating the possibility that venues could hold up to 10,000 fans in areas where “quasi-emergency” measures, such as shorter restaurant hours, have been lifted.”
The Olympic Games will be aired in the US on NBC via live television broadcasts and NBC streaming services. Some governors of US States, like New York’s Mario Cuomo have lifted Covid restrictions due to their states meeting a vaccination threshold of 70%, meaning sports bars in those states will likely be airing the Olympic Games for their customers.