Gabriel Crossley and Martin Quin Pollard

BEIJING (Reuters – China will test its meticulous plans for preventing an Olympics-seen COVID-19 outbreak, by locking all athletes in a closed loop to prepare for the upcoming Winter Games.

Omicron has only been reported in one country. COVID-19 was first discovered in Wuhan’s central city two years back. The zero-tolerance policy of strict lockdowns and contact tracing has greatly reduced international arrivals.

For the Games, which start February 4, more than 2,000 athletes from around the world will travel to China. There are also 25,000 others “stakeholders” who may be present in China. Many of these stakeholders come from far away. Organisers didn’t say how many people would be included in the closed-loop.

Yan Jiarong spoke at a news conference on Thursday to say that organizers believed their measures could “ensure the Winter Olympic Games, and the Winter Paralympic Games” can be held as planned.

The restrictions at the Games venue in Beijing, Zhangjiakou (northern Hebei province) will be tighter than during the Tokyo Olympics.

The planning process is based on a closed loop system that strictly separates Games personnel from local residents. Overseas participants fly directly to and from the bubble.

Tokyo’s bubble, created when Delta was surging worldwide, was enforced. However, local residents, such as journalists, volunteers, and others, were permitted to access and leave the country. Some visitors from overseas could also exit after 14 days of being there and testing negative.

Omicron is far more easily transmissible than other variants. It has now caused global COVID-19 infection to reach record levels and disrupted the sporting calendar.

North America’s National Hockey League has announced that its 90-game postponement means it won’t send any of its players to Rio due to COVID-19-induced scheduling difficulties. A Canadian Olympic Committee CEO stated that he has concerns about the Games’ ability to go ahead as expected.

It is sometimes called a sprinter. Omicron has a high infectious rate and is quick,” Irene Petersen (professor of epidemiology, University College London) said.

She stated that the U.N.’s climate conference, held in Glasgow this fall, showed how large-scale global events can keep transmissions down through lots and lots of testing.

She stated, “But that’s in the Delta Era… we haven’t seen anything similar to the Omicron.”

FEW CASES AT TEST EVENTS

According to games organizers, Beijing’s COVID-19 measure proved effective during test events that were held in April with over 2,000 international participants. Beijing only reported a few cases of athletes in test events.

Yanzhong, senior fellow in global health for the Council on Foreign Relations (a U.S. thinktank), stated, “The system was designed to minimize the chance of Chinese people being exposed.

However, the danger of new infection will rise with the Olympics. He stated that this is due to “not only the vulnerability of these outbreaks in China because many people have not been affected by the virus but also the failure to prevent them from happening again using the Chinese vaccine.”

Around 85% of Chinese have had their shots administered by Sinopharm or Sinovac. All the approximately 20,000 Chinese athletes who are expected to participate in the Olympic closed-loop have been immunized. The effectiveness readings for Chinese shots in clinical trials were between 50% to 83.5% for symptomatic diseases, which is below the 90% figure for shots from China. Pfizer (NYSE: Moderna (NASDAQ:).

Although recent studies have shown that vaccines against Omicron show weaker antibody responses than other strains of Omicron, it is not clear how this variant could affect the effectiveness.

BUBLES AND TESTS

Beijing Winter Games will not allow international spectators, as was the case in Tokyo. Local attendance is expected to be restricted.

Before being permitted to fly on specially-arranged flights to Beijing, Olympic athletes must prove that they are negative every time. Participants must either be immunized upon arrival or undergo three weeks in quarantine. Each person will have to be tested on a daily basis.

But, these tests are not reliable in detecting cases within the virus’s incubation period. Organisers also acknowledged they expected a “certain amount” of COVID-19 patients given the number of international arrivals.

Petersen from University College London stated, “If you are going to use testing to exclude infectious people you will need to test them at their door.”

Michael Baker, a University of Otago professor of Public Health in Wellington said that travel from many countries, as well as the high number of athletes and staff, creates difficulties. This is compounded by Omicron’s shorter incubation and higher transmissibility.

“Consequently, it will be difficult to contain outbreaks that occur during the Olympics, with the risk of transmission between Games participants and also into the wider community.”