Pregnant volleyball player Diana Reyes from Puerto Rico discovered that she was having a baby just two days before leaving for Rio Olympics. The doctor permitted her to travel and play, the Sun Magazine reports.
Reyes got in a car crash and did not have serious injuries but had to be checked in the hospital. But to her surprise, the medical results were not as she expected. More than an injury, she discovered to be carrying a bundle of joy instead. The 23 year old athlete still had the chance to leave for Brazil two days after.
Neither the baby nor the Zika scare hindered Reyes from chasing victory in the olympics. Nonetheless, they crashed with three losses towards the finals. Reyes still got her way to Rio and perhaps this is not the only case that a pregnant woman was able to compete in the olympics. There was Liz Young who was able to compete in Women's British Open despite being pregnant on her seventh month.
The Zika outbreak in Brazil is a threat to the pregnant athletes like Reyes. It is also feared that the Rio Olympics will contribute much into spreading the virus from Brazil to the other parts of the world. As opposed to this, CBS news reported that there is "Very low risk" of Zika spreading from Rio Olympics.
It is recalled that Brazil is at the epicenter of the current Zika outbreak. It has recorded over 100,000 cases of the mosquito-borne virus and have had very serious cases of pregnancy effects like microcephaly on babies, underweight newborn, and some lung and heart diseases because of the sting from a single Zika mosquito.
Over a million spectators and 10,000 athletes are in Brazil and we will all see what happens to the world when everyone goes home. Zika virus can be transferred from person to person through sex and a simple mosquito bite (where a mosquito bites a zika affected person and bites another person).
