An Olympic super-spreader event?
While athletes in the Olympic village will have all tested negative before arriving in Japan, they will inevitably come in contact with tens of thousands of untested volunteers who will be shuttling between the Olympic venues and their homes.
The Tokyo 2020 website said volunteers should take public transport to Olympic venues when they are volunteering. In Tokyo on Tuesday there were 510 new confirmed cases of Covid-19.
In a statement to CNN, Tokyo 2020 said it had published a leaflet informing volunteers about Covid-19 countermeasures, including mask wearing, washing hands and keeping a safe distance from others.
In response to a question on whether any Tokyo 2020 events would be postponed due to Covid, the statement said that the situation was "changing every moment."
Holthus said in addition to the hand sanitizer and two face masks, Games officials had offered volunteers a "health condition diary" in which they could record their own health status.
"It's going to be concentrated groups of people from all over the world, mixing together. What if there is a cluster that develops in one of the Olympic venues? What if it comes from one of us?" she said.
Oka, the Saitama Medical University professor, shared the volunteers' concerns, saying the Games could enable the spread of dangerous Covid-19 variants not only through Japan, but around the world.
Oka said he was also concerned Japan's already stretched hospital system wouldn't be able to cope if there was a sudden influx of athletes and volunteers infected with the virus. "As an infectious disease specialist, I cannot approve of holding the Games in a situation where not enough vaccinations has been made and enough countermeasures put in place," he said.
In a statement to CNN, the Tokyo 2020 organizing body said it had "high hopes" the Covid-19 situation in Japan would improve ahead of the Olympics. "We will continue to work closely with these parties as we prepare to deliver a safe and secure Games this summer," the statement said.
Olympics volunteer Philbert Ono said he trusted the government and the IOC to keep the athletes and volunteers safe.
"The Japanese, they love to witness history. And you know this Olympics is very, very much a historical Olympics ... this is going to be a very different Olympics. And that's another thing I'm looking forward to," he said. "I just want to see how they do it."
But Holthus said she didn't believe the Games should go ahead with the current state of preparation, which was a "recipe for a super spreader event."
"We can't even yet imagine how bad it could be," she said. "But the damage will be done once the Games are being held. There's no turning that back once everybody flies in."
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