Olympics chiefs play down Covid fears as first athletes test positive

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Andrew Feinberg

White House Correspondent

Olympics chiefs have played down fears of a Covid cluster at the Paris Games after the Australia water polo team reported two players had tested positive and were isolating.

The Australian team said the first athlete to test positive for Covid chose not to train with her teammates on Tuesday afternoon and a second player, who was a close contact, later also tested positive.

The 2020 Tokyo Olympics were delayed by a year and held largely without spectators but Paris 2024 will be the first post-pandemic summer Olympics. While there is no obligation to wear a mask, anybody with symptoms is being asked to stay at home or at their hotel to avoid spreading the disease.

“I need to emphasise that we are treating Covid no differently to other bugs like the flu. This is not Tokyo,” Australia’s Olympic team chief Anna Meares told a press conference on Tuesday.

“It was late last night when she presented with symptoms and the good thing is that having our own testing equipment means that we can get that information really, really quickly and intervene both in diagnosis and treatment,” Meares added.

The opening ceremony for the Paris Olympics takes place on Friday, with hundreds of thousands of spectators expected to line the Seine in the city.

France’s health minister Frederic Valletoux said there was only a small increase in Covid cases in the country ahead of the Olympics.

“Of course Covid is here. We’ve seen a small peak,” he said. “But we are far from what we saw in 2020, 2021, 2022.

“Some precautions are being taken but, because the level at which Covid is spreading is very low, they depend on the organisers.”