Olympic Games
Sydney 15.9.2000 - 1.10.2000
Final results

It is a nonsense to say that the USA (270 000 000 inhabitants) or China (1 240 000 000) gloriously obtained more medals than Iceland (300 000) or Qatar (700 000)! Here is a more rational ranking (inhabitants per medal):

  Country Inhabitants
per Medal
Inhabitants Medals
Total
1 Bahamas 150 000 300 000 2
2 Barbados 300 000 300 000 1
3 Iceland 300 000 300 000 1
4 Australia 316 000 18 300 000 58
5 Jamaica 357 000 2 500 000 7
6 Cuba 379 000 11 000 000 29
7 Norway 440 000 4 400 000 10
8 Estonia 500 000 1 500 000 3
9 Hungary 600 000 10 200 000 17
10 Belarus 606 000 10 300 000 17
11 Netherlands 620 000 15 500 000 25
12 Bulgaria 646 000 8 400 000 13
13 Trinidad and Tobago 650 000 1 300 000 2
14 Qatar 700 000 700 000 1
15 Sweden 733 000 8 800 000 12
16 Lithuania 740 000 3 700 000 5
17 Switzerland 789 000 7 100 000 9
18 Greece 808 000 10 500 000 13
19 Latvia 833 000 2 500 000 3
20 Romania 869 000 22 600 000 26
21 Denmark 883 000 5 300 000 6
22 Georgia 900 000 5 400 000 6
23 New Zealand 900 000 3 600 000 4
24 Slovenia 1 000 000 2 000 000 2
25 Slovakia 1 060 000 5 300 000 5
26 Finland 1 275 000 5 100 000 4
27 Czech Republic 1 288 000 10 300 000 8
28 Germany 1 437 000 81 900 000 57
29 France 1 574 000 59 800 000 38
30 Kuwait 1 600 000 1 600 000 1
31 Korea 1 625 000 45 500 000 28
32 Russian Federation 1 678 000 147 700 000 88
33 Costa Rica 1 700 000 3 400 000 2
34 Italy 1 706 000 58 000 000 34
35 Macedonia 2 000 000 2 000 000 1
36 Belgium 2 040 000 10 200 000 5
37 Great Britain 2 100 000 58 800 000 28
38 Canada 2 143 000 30 000 000 14
39 Moldova 2 150 000 4 300 000 2
40 Ukraine 2 204 000 50 700 000 23
41 Kazakhstan 2 357 000 16 500 000 7
42 Croatia 2 400 000 4 800 000 2
43 Austria 2 533 000 7 600 000 3
44 Azerbaijan 2 667 000 8 000 000 3
45 Poland 2 757 000 38 600 000 14
46 United States of America 2 759 000 267 600 000 97
47 Uruguay 3 200 000 3 200 000 1
48 Yugoslavia 3 533 000 10 600 000 3
49 Spain 3 573 000 39 300 000 11
50 Ireland 3 600 000 3 600 000 1
51 Armenia 3 800 000 3 800 000 1
52 Kenya 3 914 000 27 400 000 7
53 Taiwan 4 300 000 21 500 000 5
54 Kyrgyzstan 4 600 000 4 600 000 1
55 Portugal 4 950 000 9 900 000 2
56 Morocco 5 400 000 27 000 000 5
57 Korea (North) 5 625 000 22 500 000 4
58 Israel 5 700 000 5 700 000 1
59 Algeria 5 740 000 28 700 000 5
60 Uzbekistan 5 800 000 23 200 000 4
61 Japan 6 989 000 125 800 000 18
62 Ethiopia 7 275 000 58 200 000 8
63 South Africa 7 520 000 37 600 000 5
64 Argentina 8 800 000 35 200 000 4
65 Saudi Arabia 9 700 000 19 400 000 2
66 Brazil 13 308 000 159 700 000 12
67 Cameroon 13 700 000 13 700 000 1
68 Chile 14 700 000 14 700 000 1
69 Iran 15 625 000 62 500 000 4
70 Turkey 15 700 000 62 800 000 4
71 Mexico 15 717 000 94 300 000 6
72 Mozambique 18 000 000 18 000 000 1
73 Sri Lanka 18 300 000 18 300 000 1
74 Thailand 20 000 000 60 000 000 3
75 China 20 949 000 1 236 000 000 59
76 Indonesia 32 850 000 197 100 000 6
77 Colombia 37 500 000 37 500 000 1
78 Nigeria 38 200 000 114 600 000 3
79 Vietnam 75 300 000 75 300 000 1
80 India 945 100 000 945 100 000 1
        928

Reading this table causes some comments. The results of the Caribbean countries, at the head of the list are interesting; and you could add those of the European delegations' athletes - e.g. France - who come from this region. Cuba has 8 times more medals per inhabitant than the USA in spite of the embargo: they must have a high performance health and education system in this island! Switzerland obtained an average of 1 medal per 789 000 inhabitants; this is more than 2 times better than the winnings of the neighbouring countries. The results of India will be better when there will be brain and thinking games.

There is no guarantee on the above numbers; you should:
- see official results in your favourite newspaper or here: http://www.olympics.com/eng/
- see official Web site of the International Olympic committee here: http://www.olympic.org/
- see data on countries in your own atlas: they could be a little different for several reasons (date of census; including, or not, other territories; etc.).

[Athena] [Sydney 2000 - Salt Lake City 2002 - Torino 2006 - Beijing 2008 - Vancouver 2010 - Sochi2014]

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