Opinion | Beijing 2022: as vaccinated NHL players head to Winter Olympics, China’s ‘zero Covid-19’ strategy put to the test

The Chinese Olympic Committee can breathe a sign of relief, potentially every NHL player who goes to Beijing this February will be vaccinated

An uneven landscape has emerged in the North American professional sports landscape while China’s ‘zero Covid-19’ strategy faces its biggest test

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Will China relax its ‘zero Covid-19’ strategy in time for Beijing 2022, or just for the Olympics specifically? Photo: Reuters

Published: 10:00pm, 19 Sep 2021Updated: 10:42pm, 19 Sep 2021

If you’re looking for vaccination success stories, you might want to check out the National Hockey League.

The NHL’s deputy commissioner Bill Daly announced it expects the league’s around 700 players to almost all be vaccinated (98 per cent) by the time the 2021-22 season kicks off October 12. This means maybe 10 to 15 players will not be vaccinated.

The announcement, weeks before the season starts, may also be an isolation tactic to weed out those final holdouts and let them know the league can move on without them. The firing of Columbus Blue Jackets assistant coach Sylvain Lefebvre, who refused to get vaccinated, further showed the NHL and its players are on the same page: get the jab, or go play somewhere else.

However an uneven landscape is emerging when it comes to professional sporting leagues in North America, amid widespread division over vaccines and vaccine passports in both the US and Canada. The National Football League finds itself in a more difficult situation: around 93.5 per cent of its players are vaccinated. There are around 200 NFL players who have yet to get the jab, and the NFL is already within its 2021-22 season, which kicked off on September 9.

US president Joe Biden’s vaccine mandate which requires employers who have more than 100 staff to require workers to be vaccinated, or for them to undergo weekly testing. The NFL said it’s been pushing a vaccine requirement for its players, however the NFL Players Association pushed back.

Chances are the NHL could hit 100 per cent when it comes to its vaccination rate. Photo: AP

However the NFL finds itself in a very different situation when it comes to its fans. According to a report by CBS, a handful of teams including the Seattle Seahawks, Las Vegas Raiders, Buffalo Bills and New Orleans Saints, are requiring fans to provide vaccination records to enter their stadiums. Other arenas are saying they never will.