Our summer had a big gap when the Olympics were cancelled. What an event of people: There are almost 15,000 paid staff working on an Olympic event. And then there are almost 14,000 volunteers, and 23,000 contractors. Vancouver's Olympics in 2014 had 57,700 personnel. And then there are 11,000 or so athletes.
With a COVID-19 perspective, it now seems unlikely to bring this number of people together next year. Just 6 months ago, the Olympic worries were finding host cities, dealing with doping and drugs, and transgender athletes, to name a few.
Here's one summary or where the future seemed headed: "Athletes are stronger and more fit than ever before, and at every Olympics we seem to be witnessing more and more exhibitions of athletic greatness. Meanwhile, transgender athletes are challenging gender regulations, host cities are going bankrupt, and genetic researchers predict an entirely synthetic human embryos in 10 years. How are these trends going to affect our future Olympics?"
The 2021 Games are scheduled to open July 23 2021. The hope/expectation expressed so far is that a vaccine will be developed by then. Australia's John Coates says that October is the crucial time to decide if 2021 will happen. A vaccine would be needed well in advance of the July start to allow the Olympic staff to prepare and for athletes to train and compete for Olympic inclusion. It seems like the Olympics will be in the news starting soon.
We're looking at a pretty butterfly today - I noticed that the Monarchs have started migrating.
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