Confusion over ‘contaminated pool or Delhi belly’ being behind athlete illness at CWG

By ANI
Thursday, October 7, 2010

NEW DELHI - Confusion surrounds whether food at the Commonwealth Games village or contaminated water in the swimming pool is the reason behind a host of athletes reporting sick.

The ‘Delhi belly’ bug has hit almost two thirds of the British swimming squad for the 2010 Commonwealth Games ever since arriving in India.

A dozen Australian swimmers and two coaches have also been struck down by stomach illnesses.

Australia’s chef de mission Steve Moneghetti said the sickness was mainly confined to the swim team and said the pool could “possibly” be causing the outbreak of illness.

The president of the Commonwealth Games Federation said this morning that there would be tests done on the pool straight away, FOX Sports reports.

“We must find this out immediately. If there’s something unsafe, we can’t swim in that water. So we’ll have to deal with it, but how quickly it can be dealt with, I can’t sit here and speculate. But it’s a matter we have to deal with the greatest of urgency,” he said.

However, Moneghetti said that the pool was tested daily and results had been “negative.”

“They’ve done tests. They’ve tested the water quality and we wouldn’t go into the pool without the water quality reports having come through. The water quality at the pool, as far as I know, from reports from head coach Leigh Nugent, he said they were happy to compete in it,” Moneghetti said.

Australian Team doctor Peter Harcourt said it may not be food-related and pointed out that it was confined to swimming when he met with Moneghetti on Wednesday.

“He doesn’t think it is food-related. It seems more confined to one particular sport, obviously we are all eating in the dining hall. We are all eating the same food but there’s very few cases across the board,” Moneghetti said. (ANI)

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