Meanwhile, last month, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and International Olympic Committee (IOC) President Thomas Bach announced in a joint statement that the 2020 Olympic Summer Games would be postponed amid the COVID-19 outbreak.

The delay is unprecedented, marking only the fourth time in modern Olympic history that the Games have been disrupted.

“In the present circumstances and based on the information provided by the WHO today, the IOC President and the Prime Minister of Japan have concluded that the Games of the XXXII Olympiad in Tokyo must be rescheduled to a date beyond 2020 but not later than summer 2021, to safeguard the health of the athletes, everybody involved in the Olympic Games and the international community,” read a statement from the IOC.

According to the statement, the Olympic flame will remain in Japan during the delay. The Summer Games will also continue to be called “Tokyo 2020,” even as they are moved to 2021.

“The leaders agreed that the Olympic Games in Tokyo could stand as a beacon of hope to the world during these troubled times and that the Olympic flame could become the light at the end of the tunnel in which the world finds itself at present,” the IOC’s statement continued.

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