2022 Commonwealth Games hit Covid-19 cases, but Indian participants pass RT- PCR tests
All of the Indian athletes who arrived in Birmingham for the beginning of the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham on Thursday, and who are staying in the various villages dispersed around the West Midlands region have passed the Covid-19 tests that were administered upon their arrival.
With over a dozen positive cases every day over the past three days, the Games have been hit hard by a wave of Covid positive cases. The Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games organizing committee and the Commonwealth Games Federation authorities have justified the actions they took as more athletes and team officials arrived here on Wednesday evening.
Only the athletes and support personnel are required to submit to a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test before leaving and another once they arrive in Birmingham for the Birmingham 2022 Games, which are being staged under relatively lenient Covid-19 regulations. According to Rajesh Bhandari, Chef de Mission of the Indian squad, "all our players have cleared the tests, there is no positive case in the Indian Contingent," on Wednesday night.
He said that before departure as well as upon arrival, PCR tests were required for all players, and they have all passed. Prior to the team's departure, two female cricket players, including star bowler Pooja Vastraker, tested positive and were sentenced to isolation in Bengaluru.
Around 1400 athletes arrived in the second-largest city in the UK for the Games in the previous few days, and the Games' organisers have reported a dozen favourable developments. However, they voiced faith in the organising committee's strategy in light of the recent wave of successful cases.
A dozen incidents a day have been reported in Birmingham 2022 in the past few days as athletes arrive in the city, according to a report on the website insidethegames.com by Peter Harcourt, medical advisor for the CGF.
According to the publication, several top team officials have questioned the Birmingham 2022 organising committee's Covid-19 policy, but Harcourt has backed the precautions put in place by the organisers.
“We are in the middle of a really tough time in the pandemic. It’s complex, it’s changing all the time. I am pretty happy with the way things are here," Harcourt was quoted as saying in the report.
“They have done an excellent job. We have lots of testing coming in so we can address the issue and keep the competition going. I am really confident that we are going to be managing Covid risk well," he added.
All travel restrictions have been lifted by the British government for visitors coming for the Commonwealth Games.
The organising committee was said to handle the positive instances "case by case," with each test subject going through a risk assessment before deciding if they needed to be isolated.
According to the article, the decision on whether to send the participants to the village or the quarantine hotel is based on their prior test results and vaccination status.
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