Japan’s new Olympic experiment is a risky mistake

ust how high a price are the citizens of Japan willing to pay for the privilege of hosting the Olympics? That question is getting a partial answer this month as a series of baseball games are being hosted — with government approval — in crowded stadiums. Various measures to protect spectators are being tested out, including smartphone apps that issue warnings about which parts of a stadium are crowded at any given moment. But if these measures fail, Japanese citizens will be left to manage the aftereffects of a possible super-spreader event — and to wonder why the government would ever undertake such a costly experiment. Hosting the Olympics is...