New COVID-19 testing threshold for Beijing Games only raises more questions

The Beijing Olympic Comittee's decision to lower the testing threshold for athletes upon arrival on Sunday has only appeared to raise more questions rather than provide clarity.

The cycle threshold (Ct) of 40 in order to produce a negative COVID-19 test for any participant arriving at the Olympics was lowered to 35.

For context, the NBA and NHL use a threshold of 30, while the NFL uses 35. As well, many places throughout Canada use a Ct value of 35.

"There's so much that we don't know in terms of how this is going to be processed, and let's say it — there's a real lack of trust," Zirin said. "The lack of trust is not just with Beijing and the Chinese government, it's with the IOC [International Olympic Committee] as well.

"So being able to compute what actually will constitute a safe Winter Olympics, make things safe not just for the athletes but for the people of Beijing, it becomes very, very difficult to decipher."

WATCH | Bring It In panel discusses updated COVID-19 testing threshold in Beijing:

From Campbell's view, the shortage of information to help people understand the values in the numbers makes it difficult to contextualize the meaning of them.

"From a communication standpoint, one thing we could all benefit from, which nobody with the power seems to want to give us, is a scale ... What do these different values mean? The numbers sort of mean something and they sort of give us some clarity, but they wind up raising more questions than they answer because they don't have context," he said.

With questions having already existed as to how the Olympics will end up transpiring, McPeak makes her case as to how many more exist regarding the process once athletes are in Beijing and ready to compete.

"Does this