Olympic torch relay started in Fukushima, Japan

This was reported on the website of the organizing committee of the Olympics. The main sporting event will open on 23 July in Tokyo.

About 10 thousand people will take part in the Olympic torch relay. The first to bear the torch was the 34-year-old footballer Azuse Iwashimizu, who played for the Japanese national team from 2006 to 2016. Recall that in 2011 the Japanese women's team won the World Cup in Germany.

Let us remind you that there will be no foreign fans at the Olympics in Japan. This decision was made by the country's authorities due to the threat of the spread of the coronavirus. Due to the pandemic, the Olympic Games, we recall, were postponed from 2020 to 2021. On the eve of the Olympics, Japan has also tightened the entry rules for foreigners: everyone arriving in the country will be sent to mandatory quarantine, and not only those arriving from countries with a registered British strain of coronavirus.

Note that Japan will lose about one and a half billion dollars on the ban for foreigners from visiting stadiums during the Olympic Games. About a million foreign fans have already purchased tickets for the competition.

Despite the tough quarantine measures, more and more Japanese are inclined to believe that this will cause the risks of an increase in the incidence and propose to cancel it altogether. The Japanese Media Research Institute conducted an international survey and found that residents of the United States, France, South Korea, China and Thailand are also in favor of a new postponement or cancellation of the Games. Moreover, in all cases - with a solid preponderance, from 70% to 95% of respondents spoke in favor of cancellation.