China has a zero-Covid policy. Can it pull off a spectacular Winter Olympics?

No spectators, no applause, no cheering... Perhaps this is your recollection of the Tokyo Olympics. The empty stands will soon be filled by "Chinese spectators" at the Beijing Winter Olympics in February next year.

That's right, only spectators from mainland China.

On 29 September, Thomas Bach, president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) held an Executive Board meeting with Andrew Parsons, president of the International Paralympic Committee, in attendance. The meeting reviewed key Covid-19 countermeasures for the Beijing Winter Olympics and Paralympics and later issued a statement on the principles that will be followed at Beijing 2022. It was decided that tickets will be sold "exclusively to spectators residing in China's mainland, who meet the requirements of the Covid-19 countermeasures".

Additionally, all participating athletes should be vaccinated as far as possible, as all personnel will follow a "two choose one" policy: individuals who have completed their vaccination two weeks before entering China will "enter the closed-loop management system upon arrival"; while those who are not fully vaccinated "will have to serve a 21-day quarantine upon arrival in Beijing".

All vaccines "recognised by the World Health Organization or related international organisations, or approved officially by the countries or regions concerned" will be accepted.

The statement further said that the closed-loop management system will cover all Games-related areas, including arrival and departure, transport, accommodation, catering, competitions, and the opening and closing ceremonies. Participants will only be allowed to move between Games-related venues for training, competitions and work within a dedicated transport system. Daily Covid-19 testing would also be mandatory for all individuals, including all domestic and international Games participants and officials.

The Beijing Organising Committee also mentioned that all the work plans of official activities and various stakeholders have been designed with an "only essential travel to China" policy in mind.

Simply put, the aforementioned regulations, measures and policies highlight that China does not want to open its doors to the world without any restrictions during the Winter Olympics. Nevertheless, it must open its doors despite its zero-Covid stance if it wants to successfully host a large-scale sporting event. The only way is to ensure that everything is within its control.

After all, it is expected that nearly 3,000 athletes will gather in Beijing for the Winter Olympics over 17 days from 4 February to 20 February 2022.

Firstly, the outside world is most concerned with the fact that only mainland Chinese spectators will be allowed to watch the Games live at the venue.

Prior to this, officials of the Tokyo Olympics strived to allow spectators in the competition venues. But under the pressure of negative public opinion, it first prohibited foreign spectators from watching the Games before banning the majority of domestic spectators as well.

Hence, it is not difficult to understand why only Chinese spectators will be allowed to watch the Beijing Winter Olympics live.

As of 6 September, over one billion people in China have been administered at least one dose of the Covid-19 vaccine, covering 77.6% of its population, while more than 969 million people have been fully vaccinated. With such a high vaccination rate, the chance of a large-scale outbreak is small and it would be controllable even if it happens.

For example, a fresh bout of Covid-19 infections broke out in China's Fujian province and later spread to many other Chinese provinces and cities. This outbreak was caused by the Delta variant and at its peak, there were over 50 new locally transmitted cases in a single day. This was considered one of the most serious outbreaks since the Nanjing outbreak that took place in July subsided.

But based on the new daily cases recorded at present, this outbreak is clearly under control.

Secondly, the Chinese government reportedly spent billions of RMB on the Beijing Winter Olympics to build the various competition venues and so on. Although the actual figure has been kept under wraps, it is still a significant expenditure considering China's continued economic slowdown. If domestic spectators are allowed, China will at least be able to recoup some of the money poured in via ticket sales and not have to end up like the Japanese government who have lost their tens of billions of dollars invested in the Tokyo Olympics.

Undoubtedly, as the first city to ever host both the summer and winter Olympics, Beijing certainly hopes to pull off yet another outstanding Olympic Games after 14 years and give China's international image and influence a boost. If the atmosphere is too quiet and there are no spectators, how will the outside world see this rising power? After all, China is currently one of the world's "model students" when it comes to combating the Covid-19 pandemic.

Despite this, to avoid any lapses, China's control measures will be tougher than the Tokyo Olympics.

Going by the measures above, the either/or options that the Beijing Organising Committee is offering to participants is seen as "unprecedented". The New York Times noted: "No major sports league in the world has a mandate that all competitors be vaccinated, or face a similar multiweek isolation period, most likely without access to training, before being allowed to compete."

Participants at the Tokyo Olympics were not required to be vaccinated, nor quarantined if they were not, and were given time allotment to visit convenience stores and local restaurants for takeout meals.

So far, there are no reports of athletes pulling out of the Beijing Winter Olympics due to the vaccination issue, while the US Olympic & Paralympic Committee announced last week that athletes must submit proof of vaccination by 1 December 2021 to be included in the delegation to Beijing.

Furthermore, the organisers have said vaccinated participants will enter a closed-loop management system, which means all athletes, officials, journalists, and a large Games work force will eat, sleep, work, and compete without leaving a bubble-like environment from the day they arrive to the moment they depart.

During the Tokyo Olympics, local news media and the workers at venues were allowed to travel between their home and the Olympic venues, while all spectators were asked to retain their ticket stubs or ticketing data for at least two weeks after they attend an event for contact tracing in case of positive cases. There was no restrictions on movement.

However, looser controls had their risks. Kyodo News reported that between 1 July and 7 August, there were 409 Covid-19 infections related to the Olympics.

With a hundred over days to go until the Beijing Winter Olympics, the preliminary controls announced above are a warm-up to the event. But long before that, there were many reports of the controversy over the Winter Olympics, the most prominent of which were the calls for a boycott from Europe and the US.

Since early this year, the calls to boycott the Beijing Winter Olympics have come mainly from the US Congress, Canadian Parliament, the European Parliament, and some Western human rights organisations, which claim that China has not improved its human rights situation. The politicians' reasons mostly involve Xinjiang, Tibet, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, as they feel China's human rights and freedom of speech are getting worse.

This is similar to what happened before the 2008 Beijing Olympics. However, unlike the situation then, this time the Winter Olympics is facing factors like the China-US competition and deteriorating China-Europe relations, which bears suspicions of boycotting for the sake of it.

However, so far, no country has announced a diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympics, nor has any sponsor or company pulled out, or any athlete. At the same time, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in mid-September that he will be attending the Winter Olympics, the first head of state to confirm attendance.

In the end, the Beijing Winter Olympics should be about the athletes. If politics is linked to this sporting event, the ones who would suffer most are these athletes who have prepared so long in order to compete.

The BBC quoted IOC vice-president, Canadian Dick Pound - the longest serving member of the IOC - saying: "The Games are not Chinese Games, the Games are the IOC Games." He added, "Our perspective on all of this is that no matter how complex and how conflicting views may exist among countries, we're trying to steer a middle course here using sport as a means of communication even in the worst of times."

Perhaps the politicisation of a China-organised Olympics is inevitable. The approaching Beijing Winter Olympics is being held in a unique time where the world is fighting a pandemic. If the Winter Olympics can bring people together and improve China's image, and take place successfully without a fresh outbreak, it will probably score big political points for the "China model".

Related: Will the West boycott Beijing's Winter Olympics over Xinjiang? | Does China still need Olympic gold medals to prove its worth? | Is there a genocide in Xinjiang? | 'Countering sanctions with sanctions': Where China's confidence comes from