Regional competitions in the Americas, Asia and Europe were called off earlier this month, with a World Cup event in Sao Paulo in Brazil also cancelled due to the coronavirus outbreak.

The IWAS Wheelchair Fencing Committee have since been working to publish a revised ranking pathway. 

This now gives more weight to athlete performances at World Cups, beginning from the original qualification start date of November 1 2018. 

The requirement for athletes to have competed in at least one World Cup in each region has been removed, as has the removal of regional Championships in 2020 which counted towards the rankings, and had more weight.

Instead, results from the best six World Cups that took place after November 1 2018, regardless of their location, will be used to calculate the top fencers in each weapon.

In addition, if two or more athletes have the same amount of points in the ranking, their best World Cup results will now be given a higher weighting in place of their performances at regional Championships.

Results from the 2019 World Championships in the South Korean city of Cheongju remain the most important factor for qualification.

"We remain incredibly disappointed to be in this position at this point of the qualification pathway for Tokyo 2020," said Pal Szekeres, IWAS Wheelchair Fencing Executive Committee chair.

"I would like to reiterate how difficult a decision it was to cancel the final Paralympic qualifiers, but with an ever-changing situation in countries we needed to offer athletes and teams some stability.

"We promised to go away and look carefully at how we could amend the IWAS Wheelchair Fencing qualification pathway to make it as fair as possible for everyone.

"We believe that we have done that with the athletes at the front of our minds, but understand that for some the revisions may mean the end of their journey this time. 

"We remain open to questions and feedback from anyone with concerns.

"I would like to thank all fencers, the Athletes’ Commission, countries, team staff and colleagues for their support and understanding in the last week. 

"We are looking forward to Tokyo 2020 where the sport can shine once again."

The revised IWAS Wheelchair Fencing Paralympic ranking process can be found here.

The International Olympic Committee have claimed the Olympic and Paralympic Games will go ahead as planned this year, despite the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. 

Wheelchair fencing is scheduled for August 26 to 30 at Makuhari Messe Hall B in the Japanese capital.