The Nobel banquet normally attracts around 1,300 guests (file)
Coronavirus fears will see the Nobel Prize banquet canceled for the first time in more than half a century, Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter reported on Tuesday.
The 2020 Nobel Laureates will be announced, but the banquet, which still takes place on December 10 and normally attracts around 1,300 guests, will not take place.
“There are two problems. You cannot bring so many people together side by side. And it is not certain that people can travel to Sweden as much as they want,” said the president of the Nobel Foundation, Lars Heikensten, in Dagens Nyheter.
The last time the banquet was canceled was in 1956, in protest against the invasion of Hungary by the Soviet Union. It was also canceled during WWI and WWII.
The Nobel Foundation was not immediately available for comment.
The prizes for achievement in science, literature and peace were created and funded by the will of the Swedish dynamite inventor and businessman Alfred Nobel and have been awarded since 1901.
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