Lewis, who qualified by finishing fourth in the women's 100m T53 final at the 2019 World Championships in Dubai, might have been accompanied by three other Bermudan Paralympic hopefuls.

But with the pandemic cancelling so many international competitions, Steve Wilson, Omar Hayward and Yushae DeSilva-Andrade have been denied the opportunity to secure their spots in the sport of boccia by earning the required world ranking points.

Athletes could qualify only by winning their respective regional championships in the year preceding the Paralympic Games or by building up ranking points at different events held across the world.

It is a particularly unfortunate situation for former Paralympian DeSilva-Andrade, who competed at Rio 2016, having been reclassified from BC2 competitor to BC1 in late 2019 without being able to carry over her previous world-ranking points.

"Jessica [Lewis] will be our only Paralympian competing in Tokyo because unfortunately none of the boccia players were able to qualify," Jennifer Southern, the Bermuda Paralympian Association secretary general told Royal Gazette.

"Last year was a real shame for the three of them.

"Due to the pandemic, none of them could compete overseas anywhere to qualify or earn enough world ranking points.

"It’s particularly unfortunate for Yushae because her classification changed, to what it should have been previously, but sadly her previous ranking points didn’t carry over with her and she’s had no opportunity to build them up.

"It’s incredibly unfair because it’s through no fault of her own.

"She moved into the classification she should have been in before, but her previous points don’t move with her.

"I know all three were really looking forward to and were confident about trying to qualify throughout last year, but obviously that didn’t happen.

"However, I’m confident they will qualify again in the future and we can look forward to them hopefully competing at the 2024 Games in Paris."

In T53 events, Lewis won world bronze and ParaPan Games gold in 2015 in the women's 100 metres before taking three medals - gold in the 100 and 400m and silver in the 800m - at the 2019 ParaPan Games in Lima.

The recent decision to put Tokyo into a state of emergency because of a sudden spike in COVID cases prompted Southern to call for the guaranteed safety of competitors ahead of the Games, with para-athletes being more susceptible to the dangers of COVID-19.

"I know there are uncertainties still with the Olympic Games and so if they are ultimately cancelled there is no way the Paralympics will go ahead," she added.

"It’s all still up in the air at the moment and we just have to hope that Tokyo manage to get things under control a bit more because you have to be able to guarantee the safety of para-athletes.

"You only have to look at the tennis players who have recently contracted COVID-19 while travelling to the Australian Open.

"You can’t take those risks with para-athletes because they are more at risk with the virus.

"At the moment, it is a case of heading into the complete unknown, really, in terms of what the Games will be like if they go ahead.

"They won’t be like previous Paralympics, that’s for certain."

Should the Paralympics proceed, Southern conceded that because of a lack of competition before the event, it is almost impossible to gauge how Lewis may fare in Tokyo, despite the 27-year-old previously being considered among the medal contenders ahead of a 2020 Games.

"The medals could be a bit of a free-for-all - you don’t really know what might happen," she said.

"All I know is Jessica is extremely motivated and she’s stronger than she’s ever been before.

"She’s really confident and is working extremely hard to be ready for the Games.

"All we can do as an association is support her the best we can and hope things improve as the Games get closer."