Days after announcing the games would go ahead as planned, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has revealed it will be postponing the Tokyo 2020 Olympics. The decision to delay the summer games comes as the coronavirus continues to spread rampantly across much of the world.

“On the basis of the information the IOC has, postponement has been decided,” longtime IOC member Dick Pound told USA Today. “The parameters going forward have not been determined, but the Games are not going to start on July 24, that much I know.”

Pound went on to suggest that the IOC will announce its next steps soon. He believes the games will be postponed until 2021. Pound has been a member of the International Olympic Committee for decades.

“It will come in stages,” he said. “We will postpone this and begin to deal with all the ramifications of moving this, which are immense.”

This past Sunday, IOC President Thomas Bach, who has already ruled out canceling the event, announced that he would be deciding the fate of the 2020 Olympics over the next four weeks. He also sent out a letter to the athletic community informing that the IOC was to begin exploring alternative means of staging the games.

Just ahead of this news, Canada and Australia had announced they would not be sending athletes to the 2020 Olympics if they were to take place on the regularly scheduled dates.

The Olympics have been canceled three times in the past, in 1916 because of World War 1 and in 1940 and 1944 because of World War II. The games had never been postponed — until now.

Visit USA Today for more on the IOC's decision to postpone the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.