After the COVID-19 Games with 0 contact, Paris 2024 will be quite the opposite. The organization of the Games will provide the 9,000 athletes – as well as coaches, trainers and other staff – with free condoms, lubricants and intimate gels. In total, each person staying in the Olympic Village (more than 14,000 in all) will receive 21 condoms per head in an event that lasts 17 days. In total, the organization will distribute 250,000 condoms to all athletes.
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‘Regardless of the Olympic Games, we are seeing an increase in the prevalence of sexually transmitted infections among the population,’ says Laurent Dalard, who is in charge of coordinating first aid and health risks within the organising committee.
In addition, to preserve sexual health, athletes and Olympic staff will be able to be tested for HIV at the Olympic Village clinic in Saint-Denis.
Far from being a novelty, the provision of condoms to athletes to preserve sexual health dates back to Seoul 1988, following concerns about the rise of AIDS across the globe.
‘It’s very important that athletes feel happy and content, in a framework of a lot of communication. We wanted to create places and environments where athletes of all genders can meet in a friendly, pleasant setting,’ says Laurent Michaud, director of the Olympic Village in Paris. The site will feature a 350-metre-long food buffet and zero alcohol free of charge.
