(ATR) Vaccination has been a "sedative" for all the inconveniences both inside and outside sports faced by athletes as they prepare for Tokyo 2020 during a global pandemic.
The mental health crisis also invaded the world of sports amid uncertainty from a deadly and unknown disease that continues to claim victims and threaten competitions.
Many sports and Olympic organizations responded, including the Mexican Olympic Committee (COM).
"In the midst of the pandemic, we provided around 1,200 psychological counseling [sessions] to athletes and coaches," Carlos Padilla Becerra, president of the COM, reveals to Around the Rings.
"They turned to us, we reacted, and we followed up on their recovery processes," he added.
The postponements and suspensions of events, highlighted by the postponement of the Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics for one year, along with health restrictions that led to travel restrictions, caused many athletes to lose interest in their daily exercise routines.
Vaccinations, the insistent assurance of the IOC and the Japanese organizers that the Games will be held despite the upswings in cases in Japan and the world, the biosecurity measures that have also allowed the development of international tournaments, many of them pre-Olympic, have all helped to recover the motivation of athletes to continue their training in different corners of the world.
"Little by little, we are freeing them," says Padilla.
The president of the COM recognizes the important help they have had from Mexican authorities, especially Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard, who has guided the various ambassadors to facilitate Mexican athletes reaching their destinations in the midst, for example, of the closure of the European borders.
Last month, the COM announced the start of the vaccination process against COVID-19 for athletes preparing for the Olympic Games.
"The COM celebrates that the management carried out by our president Carlos Padilla with the Mexican president Andrés López Obrador has been followed up and that it is already finalized that the Sputnik V vaccine against COVID-19 is applied to athletes heading to Tokyo 2020," the institution announced on Twitter.
Padilla Becerra estimates that the Mexican delegation could be made up of between 130 and 150 athletes, including members of the already qualified soccer, baseball and softball teams.
"The pandemic has hit us but we have been able to continue with the preparation," says Padilla, who has been at the helm of COM since 2012. During his tenure, Mexico has achieved brilliant performances at the Central American and Caribbean Games in Barranquilla, Colombia, in 2018 and at the Pan American Games in Lima, Peru, in 2019.
Written and reported by Miguel Hernandez
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