While many sports have cancelled qualification tournaments, athletics qualification is determined on making the qualifying time, height or distance and more importantly, their world ranking. 

In a statement World Athletics said, "Athletics is in a relatively good position because we have a very flexible system and the qualification period began more than ten months ago.

"There have been a lot of opportunities to qualify already and most of our athletes have already qualified.

"We still have two months to go before the international outdoor season begins in earnest and much can change in that time, as it has in the last two months."

World Athletics have already launched the new Continental Tour which they claim will also allow more opportunities to compete ahead of the qualification deadline on June 29.

"While many international events are being cancelled, some athletes will still be able to do further qualifying competitions in their own countries over the coming months."

They plan to publish a full tracking tool called the 'Road to the Olympic Games' at the end of March to show who has qualified for Tokyo.

However, if more cancellations are to come, they plan to look at other options for qualification. 

"If the cancellation of events and restrictions on travel begin to disadvantage certain countries or athletes in the World Rankings System, we will adjust it, and we will also assess any individual cases that are brought to us."

Three Diamond League events have already been postponed in Qatar and China with more under threat if the pandemic continues long into the spring with the International Olympic Committee (IOC) asking for International Federations to publish their revised schedules in early April.