The U.S. Olympic Committee has denied telling its sports federations that their athletes and officials should avoid going to Brazil this summer if they have concerns about the Zika virus.
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In a statement on Monday, another USOC spokesman Patrick Sandusky said media reports that the USOC has advised US athletes to reconsider competing in Rio due to the Zika virus were inaccurate.
The message was delivered in a conference call involving USOC officials and leaders of USA sport federations in late January, according to two people who participated in the call.
Feeling the heat, presumably, Brazilian officials now say they’re sending a set of samples related to the Zika outbreak to the U.S.
There is a greater risk of birth defects for the children of pregnant mothers infected with the Zika virus, but the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is gaining knowledge on the overall impact of the virus on pregnant women.
With the spread of the virus, some countries have noticed a huge increase in the number of babies born with microcephaly, a neurological disorder where a baby’s head is significantly smaller and the brain is abnormally developed, according to the Mayo Clinic. As the CDC did last week, they also called on men to use condoms with pregnant partners if they have visited countries where the virus is present.
There is no now vaccine to prevent infection or medication to treat Zika. Forster says the World Health Organization has now labeled it an global public health emergency.
But British rower Andrew Triggs Hodge said his wife Eeke would not accompany him because of the “very real and frightening threat” posed by Zika.
The CDC now reports 51 known Zika cases in the continental United States – 50 of them contracted while traveling overseas, and one through sexual transmission.
People with Zika virus disease usually have a mild fever, skin rash, headache, muscle and joint pain, malaise and conjunctivitis.
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Still, she said that the U.S.is “optimistic” that there won’t be large-scale outbreaks domestically “but we’re not betting on it and we want to do everything we can to make sure that we don’t have wide-spread transmission here”. This mosquito is found throughout the world but especially in tropical and sub-tropical areas of the Americas, Africa, Asia, and the Pacific.
