Thomas Bach, the current President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), is endangering the lives of child athletes competing in the Olympics.
Child Athletes’ early and intense exposure to the internet and social media, loss of childhood due to sport specialization, extraordinary pressure from coaches, parents, and association, and risk of assault are some of the many reasons children should be banned from competing in the Olympics.
The National Library of Medicine took time to analyze the psychosocial impact on child athletes as sport specialization often requires increased training hours and may predispose young athletes to social isolation, poor academic performance, increased anxiety, greater stress, inadequate sleep, decreased family time and burnout.
These scientists and medical professionals in this article highlighted the main impacts sport specialization has on children and their lives. They concluded that it is clearly not good for the physical and mental health of the children to participate in sport specialization.
It is evident that specialized child athletes are exposed to abusive environments from a young age as they tend to travel with non parent adults and have closer relationships with coaches and trainers.
For example Larry Nassar, who was the United States Women’s National Gymnastics Team Doctor for 18 years, who abused his position to exploit, deceive and sexually assault at least 265 young women and girls. Although Nassar has been caught and will serve the rest of his life in jail, it took 18 years for the victims to realize their abuse and/or find the courage to come forward.
The article also addresses that an increase in training volume for sport specialization directly affects physical and psychological health by diminishing sleep duration and quality. This is challenging for not only the needs of the child as they develop, but proper sleep can improve mental health and prevent injury.
They even included the fact that it is recommended that children ages six to 12 sleep nine to 12 hours per night, and children ages 13-18 years old should sleep eight to 10 hours per night. However, athletes sleep an average of 6.8 hours per night, with elite athletes sleeping slightly less. Additionally, more than 40% of 137 elite, young French athletes with high training volumes reported poor or just sufficient sleep quality, which is associated with poor academic performance.
The article concludes by sharing that it is easy for young athletes to experience burnout from this lack of sleep, need for perfection, pressures to do well, challenges academically and so much more. However, it is hard to detect this burnout, which is why sport specialization can be so dangerous. Many children can go undetected and do not receive help in time.
Another reason children Olympians damage their health is because they can be villainized from such a young age. Consider Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva, who competed in the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics at just 15 years old. She was originally idolized for being the first woman to land a quad jump in the Olympics. She was then turned into a symbol of athletic corruption after it was found she took banned medication to increase her endurance.
Not only was her health challenged for the encouragement to take this illegal and potentially dangerous drug, but her career was ruined when it had just taken off. She eventually tested negative and was allowed to compete, but the global media was relentless in calling her a “dirty cheater”, “disgraceful” and left a “permanent scar” on figure skating.
This pressure and negative press allowed her to slide down in rankings and leave the rink in tears. She went on to claim she no longer has emotions at only age 15, feeling similar to another figure skater, Alexandra Trusova. At just 17 years old, Alexandra was caught on camera screaming, “I hate it! I don’t want to do anything in figure skating ever in my life,” following the finals, and later claimed that “there is no happiness.”
The neglect of a child’s safety for the profit of the Olympics and the superiority complex of their countries is terrifying and must be stopped.
Young athletes who specialize in sports for the goal of competing in the Olympics or at a national level are clearly damaging their development, physical and mental health, relationships with peers and family, academic performance, safety, exposure to the real world and much more.