The same course that Britain's Timothy Baillie and Etienne Stott won gold at London 2012 was set to host the ECA European Canoe Slalom Championships ©Getty Images

The European Canoe Association (ECA) and British Canoeing have cancelled the ECA Canoe Slalom European Championships due to the coronavirus pandemic.

With the event set to be hosted at Lee Valley, the course used for canoeing at London 2012, it was called off having been scheduled from May 15 to 17 in the United Kingdom.

"It is regretted that this has happened, but here was no realistic alternative," said Albert Woods, President of the European Canoe Association. 

He added: "The International Canoe Federation (ICF) and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) agreed that the European Canoe Slalom selection in Lee Valley could not go ahead because of the coronavirus which had prevented competitors travelling from their countries of origin."

The Championships were set to be used as an Olympic qualifier for Tokyo 2020, but under ICF rules, the Canoe Slalom world ranking will be used for selection.

ECA will still look to host the Championships later in the year with a potential new location on the cards and will only be cancelled for 2020 if there is no interest in hosting the event.

More than 215,000 cases have been confirmed to date globally with 2,626 coming from the United Kingdom.