FIFA President: Football Players Are Not Priority For Vaccine Recipients

Gianni Infantino (Photo: Antara)

JAKARTA - President of the world soccer body (FIFA) Gianni Infantino said on Monday that football players should not be considered as a priority group to receive the COVID-19 vaccine.

Several countries that have started vaccinating athletes or plan to have them injected before the Olympics, which will be held in Tokyo from July 23, have drawn criticism.

However, Infantino, who launched a joint campaign with the World Health Organization (WHO) to promote fair access to vaccines, said he was not a supporter of footballers jumping queues.

"The priorities for vaccines are of course the people at risk and for health workers. This is very clear in our minds. I do not consider football players to be the priority group in this regard," he told a news conference.

"Of course for safety reasons, in the context of the coming months, in the context of international competitions and travel, vaccination might be recommended at some point and the Olympics, of course, only in summer. But all this will happen, of course, with respect to the distribution arrangements that have been established. There are people who are at risk and these people have to get priority of course and that is not football players or officials, "he added.

But Infantino said he was confident that the stadium would be full at next year's World Cup in Qatar.

"I really, really believe (it) will be amazing, will have the same miracle, unite the world. We will return to where we should be," he said.

The World Cup will be held in Qatar in November and December 2022 and will feature 32 participating nations.

"COVID will be defeated by then. If we don't get there in two years, we will all have a bigger problem than the World Cup," he said.

Qualifying matches for the tournament have already started in Asia and South America and will kick off in Europe in March.

Asked about the wisdom of holding international matches in the current situation, Infantino said matches would take place under "clear health protocols that will not harm anyone's health".

"There's always a balance we have to strike, but we need to respect the decisions of governments around the world ... the situation is very, very different around the world.

"We will be monitoring the situation in the coming weeks, we can see the situation developing by the week.

"The international matches will be played in March; then we will assess the situation and see where we can play and under what conditions, and we will definitely not take any risk to anyone's health when we play football," he said.