Zika threat sparks call to move games
The Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro should be postponed or moved because of the risk from the Zika virus, more than 100 leading experts say.
In an open letter to the World Health Organisation, 125 academics from institutions including Oxford University, Harvard and Yale say new findings about the virus make it ‘‘unethical’’ to continue with the games.
They say that Rio’s mosquito eradication programme has failed to slow the spread of the virus, and that continuing with plans to hold the 2016 summer Olympic Games and Paralympic Games there risks exacerbating a public health emergency – and will result in more children being born with deformities.
The letter will put more pressure on the International Olympic Committee and the organisers of the Rio games, which start on August 5, as they try to assure tourists that it is safe to visit Brazil.
The international group of academics includes bioethicists, lawyers, and professors of medicine.
The letter said that continuing with the games put athletes in the unacceptable position where they had to ‘‘choose between risking disease and participating in a competition that many have trained for their whole lives’’.
It said the bigger concern was the spectators travelling in their thousands to Rio de Janeiro. ‘‘Our greater concern is for global health. The Brazilian strain of Zika virus harms health in ways that science has not observed before.
‘‘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.
‘‘It is unethical to run the risk, just for games that could proceed anyway if postponed and/or moved.’’
The call comes amid increasing evidence of the link between Zika and severe birth defects. The virus, which is spread by mosquitoes, has been known for almost 70 years but was thought to have only mild symptoms.
An outbreak in South America has coincided with a rise in microcephaly, a debilitating condition in which babies are born with smaller heads. Recent experiments have appeared to show that the virus can be spread to babies in the womb, causing the defects. The consensus now is that the two are linked.
With other studies showing that Zika can also be sexually transmitted, the global health community has been sufficiently concerned that the director-general of the World Health Organisation described it as a ‘‘threat of alarming proportions’’.
Despite this, the WHO has not gone so far as advising that the games should stop. Instead, it has called for people travelling to the region to protect themselves from insect bites, and to use condoms for at least four weeks after travel to a Zika-infected area. The experts’ letter said this was not sufficient.
No Olympics have ever been moved from the host city because of medical concerns, but in 2003 Fifa switched the Women’s World Cup football tournament from China to the US at short notice because of the threat posed by the Sars respiratory virus.