Five-time Olympian Ken Terauchi, already qualified for a sixth Games for Japan at the Tokyo 202One Olympic Games next summer, is being treated in hospital after testing positive for the novel coronavirus.
He is the only member of the Japanese Olympic team known to have been infected with the coronavirus.
Citing the diver’s sponsor, the Kyodo news agency reports that Terauchi “experienced initial symptoms of the virus on July 25 and had a fever measuring over 37 C on July 27 and 28”.
He underwent a polymerase chain reaction, or PCR, test last Friday after he was alerted to the fact that an acquaintance he had met after training on July 24 had tested positive for the virus.
Now 39 and a veteran of his sport, Ken Terauchi claimed 3m Springboard bronze at a 2001 home World Championships in Fukuoka and reached the final in his events at the four Games between 2000 and 2012 but missed the marek at the Rio Games in 2016.
He is reported to be fighting fever yet and has suffered a decline in his sense of taste and smell, Kyodo reports.
Ken Terauchi, along with teammate Sho Sakai, became the first Japanese to qualify for the Tokyo Olympics in any sport after finishing seventh in the men’s 3-meter synchronized competition at the world championships in Gwangju, South Korea, in July last year.
Athletes and staff from Terauchi’s diving club who recently practiced with him at a rented pool in Osaka are now undergoing PCR tests. None have so far reported any symptoms of the virus, according to Kyodo.