‘I am opposed to vaccination’: Tennis star Novak Djokovic slammed for COVID-19 comment

TJ Macias
·3 min read

Tennis star Novak Djokovic picked a peculiar time to admit he’s an anti-vaxxer.

In a Facebook live chat on Sunday, the world’s No. 1 men’s player said he would be opposed to a COVID-19 vaccination if it was needed for sports to resume.

Globally, there are over 2.4 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 and more than 166,000 deaths, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. The virus has shut down a normal way of life and has suspended the sports world, which seems to have Djokovic backtracking on his anti-vaccination stance.

“I will have to make a decision,” he said about a possible COVID-19 vaccination. “I have my own thoughts about the matter and whether those thoughts will change at some point, I don’t know. Hypothetically, if the season was to resume in July, August or September, though unlikely, I understand that a vaccine will become a requirement straight after we are out of strict quarantine and there is no vaccine yet.”

Like all of profession sports, tennis has been deeply affected by the coronavirus pandemic. The 2020 Wimbledon championships have been canceled and the French Open, which was scheduled for May 24, has been moved to the end of September.

The Twitter world had some interesting reactions to discovering that Djokovic, who won the Australian Open in January for his 17th grand slam title, is an anti-vaxxer:

News outlets have been quick to point out that anti-vaxxers have been rather quiet during the coronavirus pandemic.

“We need a vaccine. However, the vaccine is only effective in preventing the disease if we have appropriate vaccine uptake,” Dr. Scott Ratzan, founder of the International Working Group on Vaccination and Public Health Solutions, told the Independent.

“If people do not take the vaccine and we do not have exposure to a level that would have overall community ‘immunity’ we could have a resurgence to cases of COVID-19 or the next coronavirus.”

In March, former world No. 1 Amelie Mauresmo tweeted out that tennis shouldn’t resume if there was no vaccine.

“International circuit = players of all nationalities plus management, spectators and people from the 4 corners of the world who bring these events to life. No vaccine = no tennis.”