Djokovic & the Oz vaccine mandate
Last week, the Australian government signalled the way forward for the country when it comes to Covid. Already home to one of the harshest lockdowns, Australia indicated that unvaccinated individuals will not be allowed to enter the country. This would cover a broad spectrum of individuals, including those who play professional sport. That obviously meant the cameras were trained on Novak Djokovic, who made some damaging comments with respect to it last year.
True to form, the Serb World No. 1, who has the opportunity to become the first man in the sport to win 21 Slams and further cement his legendary status, was coy when asked about his vaccination status. “I don’t know if I’m going to go to Australia. I don’t know what’s going on. The situation right now is not good,” he told a Serbian publication. “I will not reveal my status whether I have been vaccinated or not. It is a private matter and an inappropriate inquiry.”
To be honest, it stops being ‘a private matter’ when being fully vaxxed is mandatory to enter a country. And the 34-year-old, while he can say it’s an ‘inappropriate inquiry’, will face these questions because of the inappropriate manner in which he conducted tennis tournaments last year, apart from his vaccination stance. As a public figure, the onus is on him to set an appropriate example. At another level, it’s also a question for the sport itself: A third of all tennis players remain unvaccinated and if a mandate forces them to get inoculated, that could be a good thing.
All governments are urging the general public to get vaccinated and stars are definitely among them. You can argue that it’s a personal choice but when your livelihood revolves around travelling all over the world and coming into contact with scores of people, the best way to keep that community safe during a pandemic is perhaps having a mandate. And that appears to be the way forward for all sports. In the US, Brooklyn Nets’ Kyrie Irving, an NBA star, hasn’t been able to play because of an active vaccine mandate in New York City. Even the World Anti-Doping Agency has approved most of the vaccines. Perhaps it’s time to put in place rules that would mandate athletes to take a vaccine.