The long awaited and long delayed Summer Olympic Games officially begin a few hours from now. But the director of the Opening Ceremony, well, he wont be running the show. He was abruptly fired yesterday, the fourth olympics official to be forced out. We are Live In Tokyo where the games have already been postponed of course for a year because of the pandemic. And covid continues to cast a shadow over them. For the first time, olympic events will be held without spectators in most venues. And only a fraction of the 11,000 athletes scheduled to play Will Parade in the Opening Ceremony. The u. S. Will have one of the larger presences with about 200 athletes. As the clock ticks down, covid cases keep ticking up. About 20 athletes have so far tested positive and have been forced to drop out. The Olympic Village has had at least a dozen cases of people Testing Positive too. We begin our coverage with Blake Essig joining me live from tokyo. And despite all of those negatives, the show is goin
We started to see a rising number of cases, doubling more rapidly than we thought. and particularly if we started to see cases appearing in the local population that seemed to be linked back into the village or vice versa. reporter: so far, that hasn t happened. but for the head of the world health organization, the olympics is a balance. the fess health of a nation versus the mental health of the world. may the message of hope resound, resound there tokyo around the world in every nation, every village. and every heart. reporter: dr. gupta, cnn, tokyo. and you can follow the games with cnn s instant coverage on our website, just point your browser to cnn.com/olympics. and we re standing by for a decision from the unesco world heritage committee on australia s great barrier reef. the marine wonder has been deteriorating for years due to
The uaustralian government agre to this, put in all measures necessary to reserve this fragile ecosystem which is basically leak the amlike the a of the ocean. it is such a special place. but the australian government as we know has been fierceless fighting this listing, it has been lobbying other member countries of unesco. the federal minister spent eight days traveling around the world visiting these places, visiting these members to lobby them to go with australia. i mean, you can t imagine the amount of taxpayer dollars as well as emissions that were spent on this trip. they want the decision to be postponed until 2023. is that two years away. the damage that further damage to the reef that could be done is just mind boggling. but as you say, we should know in the next couple of hours.
Attendance. australia s team says that it will have about 63 athletes and officials in the ceremony. the team has about 470 athletes in all. south korea says 26 out of 2 # 2 a 232 athletes will take part, indep i said i cndependent i can t says0 out of nearly 230 will take part. as olympians gear up to take center stage, so too of course is japan. the world is watching how the country will host the world s biggest sporting event in the middle of a pandemic. dr. sanjay gupta looks at the challenges it faces. reporter: it was never going to be easy. the olympic games in the medal of a pandemic in a city now in a state of emergency. the usual fanfare, muted. making way for concerns over covid-19. while it is true that no kuchb
Climate change and natural disasters, but the australian government is fighting hard against a possible in danger listing. anna coren is following this for us live from hong kong. so what would a classification mean for the reef and what is the australian government worried about? reporter: i just got off the phone from another scientist who studies the reef. and she said that if the listing went ahead, that if the great barrier reef was to be listed as in danger, that basically all that does is shine a global spotlight on the problems. the problems of climate change facing the great barrier reef. as you say, one of the, you know, great natural wonders of the world. it is the largest living infrastructure on the planet. you can see it from space. and people are sort of shaking their heads as to doctor worpt