Chicago Bulls player Pau Gasol says he is considering skipping the Olympics this summer because Brazil is the epicenter of the Zika outbreak.
The Spanish basketball star said there’s so much uncertainty about the situation in Brazil that some athletes, including him, may skip the games to be held in Rio de Janeiro in August.
“It wouldn’t surprise me to see some athletes deciding not to participate in the games to avoid putting their health and the health of their families at risk,” Gasol said. “I’m thinking about (whether or not to go) … just like every athlete, or any other person considering going to Rio, should be thinking about it.”
Brazil was one of the first countries with widespread transmission of the Zika virus, which can cause babies to be born with severe birth defects, including abnormally small heads.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has urged pregnant women to avoid traveling there and warns everyone else to take precautions against mosquitoes, which is how the virus is primarily spread. Some prominent bioethicists have called for the games to be postponed for at least six months.
Even so, the World Health Organization said last week that it is not calling for the Olympics to be canceled or postponed, instead urging athletes and travelers there to take a series of steps to guard against infection. Marcos Espinal, who directs the Zika response for the WHO’s Pan American Health Organization, said the games should still take place because August will be winter in Brazil.
Espinal said he expects “very little circulation of mosquitoes and virus in Brazil in August.”
