Toshiro Muto, chief Organizing Committee for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics says about 10,000 of the 80,000 registered volunteers supporting athletic events had quit as of Wednesday.
Muto, told Japanese media he does not believe the volunteer withdrawals will impact the operation of the Games, which were postponed last year due to the pandemic. The rescheduled event is due to start on July 23.
Volunteers are an instrumental part of the Summer Olympics. They help staff operate Olympic facilities and venues, and assist spectators and athletes. So if more continue to drop out, it could pose additional difficulties for organizers.
However, no foreign spectators are allowed into Japan for the Games, so organizers may not need as many volunteers as other host cities have in years past.
A first cohort of volunteers dropped out in February — the same month the president of the Games’ organizing committee resigned. The official, Yoshiro Mori, stepped down after sexist remarks he made in a meeting were leaked.
Though officials did not say why most of the 10,000 volunteers quit, it is likely tied to the pandemic. Opinion polls show most of the Japanese public oppose holding the Olympics, with hospitals overwhelmed by a fourth wave of Covid-19 cases and the vast majority of people still unvaccinated.
The country has reported more than 752,000 total coronavirus cases and more than 13,200 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University.
Daily new cases have been in the low thousands in recent days, declining from a fourth-wave peak of nearly 8,000 on April 29.
