A statement from World Rugby said: “World Rugby, the Hong Kong Rugby Union and Sport Singapore have taken the decision to reschedule the Hong Kong and Singapore rounds of the HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series 2020 in response to continued health concerns relating to the Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak.

“The health and safety of our players, fans and everyone working on the event is always our highest priority. This prudent decision has been taken in order to help protect the global rugby community and the wider public and was taken based on the World Health Organisation and relevant public authority travel and health guidelines. The decision is fully supported by stakeholders, including unions and commercial partners.

“Fans who have purchased tickets for Singapore and Hong Kong via official channels are advised that their tickets will be honoured for the rescheduled events and a full refund will be provided in the event fans are unable to attend the rescheduled events.”

Scotland 7s Head Coach Ciaran Beattie said: “Rugby takes a back seat when it comes to issues like this and we are of course fully supportive of the measures taken by World Rugby to ensure public health and safety.”

Scotland’s next event takes place in Los Angeles on 29 February – 1 March, before they travel to Vancouver a week later.