Arriving at the Tokyo Olympics Amid a Global Pandemic
Clare Warwick has wanted to be an Olympian ever since she attended the Sydney Olympics as a spectator in 2000. Now she might get her chance. The 34-year-old and her teammates in the Australian softball squad touched down in Japan on Tuesday, making them some of the earliest competitors to arrive for the Tokyo Games.
“I remember watching a couple of my idols play,” says Warwick, the team’s shortstop. “I thought, ‘yeah I think I would like to give this a go,’ and that’s always been in the back of my mind over the years.”
The team’s arrival has been hailed as a major milestone for the Olympics, but it comes as critics call for the cancellation of Games amid Japan’s battle against a stubborn fourth COVID wave. On May 28, the Japanese government extended its COVID-19 state of emergency on Tokyo and several other areas until June 20. (The Olympics are scheduled to start on July 23.) Although new cases have declined in recent weeks, the country of 126 million is still recording around 3,000 cases a day.
The pandemic means this year’s Olympics will be unlike any other. Although there are some individual …
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