OLYMPICS TO STAY
WHO REJECTS CALLS BY HEALTH EXPERTS TO POSTPONE GAMES OVER ZIKA FEARS.
LONDON: The World Health Organisation (WHO) rejected a call for the Rio Olympic Games to be moved or postponed due to the threat posed by large outbreak of Zika virus in Brazil.
Responding to a call from more than 100 leading scientists, who said it would be unethical for the games to go ahead as scheduled, the United Nations health agency said having the games in Rio as planned would “not significantly alter” the spread of Zika, which is linked to serious birth defects.
“Based on the current assessment of Zika virus circulating in almost 60 countries globally and 39 in the Americas, there is no public health justification for postponing or cancelling the games,” the WHO said in a statement.
In a public letter posted online on Friday, around 150 leading public health experts, many of them bioethicists, said the risk of infection from the Zika virus is too high for the games to go ahead safely.
The letter was sent to Margaret Chan, the WHO’s director-general, and said that the games, due to be held in Rio de Janeiro in August, should be moved to another location or delayed.
“An unnecessary risk is posed when 500,000 foreign tourists from all countries attend the games, potentially acquire that strain, and return home to places where it can become endemic,” the letter said.
The authors also noted that despite increased efforts to wipe out the mosquitoes that spread Zika, infections in Rio have gone up rather than down.
WHO declared the Zika epidemic to be a global emergency in February and in its latest assessment this week, said it “does not see an overall decline in the outbreak”.
“The fire is already burning, but that is not a rationale not to do anything about the Olympics,” said Amir Attaran, a professor at the University of Ottawa and one of the letter’s authors.
“It is not the time now to throw more gasoline onto the fire.”
But the WHO rejected the call, saying Brazil “is one of almost 60 countries and territories” where Zika has been detected and that people continued to travel between these countries and territories for a variety of reasons.
“The best way to reduce risk of disease is to follow public health travel advice,” it said.
The WHO’s advice is that pregnant women should not travel to areas with ongoing Zika virus transmission, including Rio de Janeiro.
It also advises everyone to make all efforts to protect against mosquito bites and to practice safe sex, as Zika can also be spread via sex in some cases.
The letter also noted a potential conflict of interest, highlighting the decades-long collaboration between WHO and the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
The authors said the “overly close” relationship “was last affirmed in 2010 at an event where the director-general of WHO and president of the IOC signed a memorandum of understanding, which is secret because neither has disclosed it”.
They also pointed to a group that WHO established to help cities not only with health advice, but to potentially help them bid for major events including the Olympics.
“WHO cannot credibly assess the public health risks of Zika and the Olympics when it sets neutrality aside,” the letter stated.
Concerns over Zika have prompted USA Swimming to move its pre-Olympic training camp from Puerto Rico to Atlanta and Major League Baseball also scrapped a series of games that were going to be held in San Juan.
No Olympic Games have ever been moved from their host city due to medical concerns, but in 2003, Fifa decided to switch the Women’s World Cup football tournament from China to the United States on short notice due to the threat posed by the respiratory virus SARS.