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Nigerian Olympics delegate is first hospitalised with COVID-19
The individual, a non-athlete in their 60s, tested positive on Thursday evening at the airport with mild symptoms but was hospitalised because of age and pre-existing conditions, the broadcaster said, without giving details.
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President of the Tokyo 2020 Organising Committee Yoshiro Mori wearing a face mask gestures as he attends a news conference after giving a presentation to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) about the rearrangement of the Tokyo Summer Olympic Games for next year, in Tokyo on July 17, 2020. - Tokyo 2020 organisers said on July 17 they have secured all the venues needed to hold the Olympics next summer, clearing a major hurdle to hosting the event postponed over the coronavirus. (Pool/AFP/Issei Kato)
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Nigerian delegate to the Olympics became the first visitor to the Tokyo Games admitted to hospital with COVID-19, broadcaster TV Asahi said on Friday, as Japan battles to stem rising local infections a week before the event.
The individual, a non-athlete in their 60s, tested positive on Thursday evening at the airport with mild symptoms but was hospitalised because of age and pre-existing conditions, the broadcaster said, without giving details.
On Friday, the Australian Olympic Committee said that tennis player Alex de Minaur, ranked 15th in the world, had tested positive prior to his departure for the Games, becoming the latest athlete to have the virus shatter his Olympics dream.
"We're very disappointed for Alex," Australia's chef de mission, Ian Chesterman, told reporters.
"He said that he's shattered, not being able to come ... but he has sent his very best wishes for the rest of the team."
De Minaur returned two positive tests in Spain before he was due to fly to Japan, David Hughes, the AOC's chief medical officer, told a news conference.
Another Olympic dream crushed was that of U.S. basketball star Bradley Beal, after USA Basketball said on Thursday the Washington Wizards star would miss the Games after entering coronavirus protocols at a training camp in Las Vegas.
The coronavirus has infected several athletes and others involved with the Games, which start on July 23, even as infections spread in Tokyo and experts warn worse may lie ahead.
Read also: Japan 'determined' to hold Olympics despite cancellation report
On Friday, top government spokesman Katsunobu Kato, told a news conference that a Ugandan athlete had gone missing, with police and the team's host city in western Japan mounting a search.
Public broadcaster NHK said the athlete was a weightlifter, whose absence from a PCR test had been spotted by an official of the host city, Izumisano, in Osaka prefecture.
Although a state of emergency has been clamped on Tokyo for the pandemic, most measures to limit its spread are voluntary and many say they have grown weary of them.
Organisers have promised that the Games, postponed from last year because of the pandemic, will be "safe and secure".
They have imposed strict testing and limits on delegates' activities to try to soothe the concern of the Japanese public, many of whom wanted the Games cancelled or postponed again.
