Experts say Olympics must be moved or postponed because of Zika

* tourism to Rio this year is presumably lower than the baseline I'm using because it is presently the site of a Zika outbreak.

* the tourism into Rio for the Olympics is especially international, so it may be reasonable to be especially concerned about its effect on global transmission of the virus.

I think the people advocating for canceling the Olympics understand that it's only 10% extra tourism, but still think that small percentage of extra tourism is a bad outcome.

> "There’s been some claims that if the Olympics happen, it’s going to disseminate the virus everywhere, it’s going to amplify it," Frieden said. "Well, we looked at the numbers. The Olympics account for less than one quarter of 1 percent of all travel to Zika-affected areas."

Total volume isn't the right consideration if almost all visitors are from places that Zika already exists or can't exist.

Update: I checked the stats: 93% of visitors to Brazil come from places where Zika already is or can't go:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourism_in_Brazil

5% are from Asia. Africa isn't mentioned, but it must be less than 2%, part of which would be from North African countries that can't get Zika.

The olympics will bring visitors from every country. It should increase the speed with which the virus reaches sub Saharan African, and Southern Asia.

I don't think your information actually allays any of the concerns, as the total stats refer to visitors from different countries than those who will be visiting during the olympics.

As others have pointed out, there are poor countries that have trouble eradicating mosquito borne disease (think malaria, which is transmitted via the same species as zika) that do not currently have zika. Increasing the speed of the spread of the disease does not seem logical given that we do not even have a vaccine.

Moreover, this is a rapidly evolving disease which is also sexually transmitted.

I would not recommend traveling to Rio or other Zika-invested countries right now. You can't just get vaccinated before travelling.

Doubling the tourism to Brazil for a month seems like a bad idea at best, hazardous at worst.

1. The Olympics venues are in places that have been particularly hard hit by the virus.

2. Much of those non-Olympic travelers are business travelers on short visits. Olympic visitors will typically visit for longer. Risk of infection should go up as length of stay goes up.

3. The virus can be sexually transmitted between humans. I'd expect that Olympic visitors have a higher probability than the average visitor of engaging in sex during their stay.

It's not the full set of hundreds of thousands of people that fly in and out of Brazil each day that you should be comparing against, but rather the subset of those that are there for vacations lasting at least a week or two.

It would then pretty much be the last 5 mega-venues (Beijing, London, ...) that could tanke turns re-doing it. Which would be a good thing.

Next option is not having it in one place. It can be a global event. It wouldn't matter if athletics is in Berlin while all the cycling is in Madrid. Would only be worse for on-site fans.

I disagree. Most of the stadiums built for olympics are bringing kids to sports and introducing them to sport activities that nobody even heard before. And every national championship is held at those venues for many years after olympics.

As such, any proposal based upon rational analysis and sound engineering must be rejected out of hand, because it does not account for kickbacks, baksheesh, palm-greasing, boondoggles, junkets, tribute, or straight bribery.

Once you adopt this view, the Olympics work perfectly, year after year, without fail. The public still benefits, because ordinarily corruption and profiteering of that magnitude requires a war, which can at times get out of hand.

I'm not particularly a fan of the Olympics, but I can see why cities bid against each other to host it.

Weelllll, with enough money you could hire body guards, or just not worry about how much is stolen from you :)

That being said, I stayed on the boardwalk of copacabana Beach at a hotel and there was never a problem day or night. If you stay in the tourist sections, the post guards and the area is very safe

And health care is a trillion dollar business, so don't cancel the Olympics, instead buy call options on the various pharma companies that might provide a vaccine soonest and invest in any lab that is working on a fast blood test for keeping the blood supply clean.

[/engage]

Random questions I don't see coming up in the news coverage, does anyone know how long Zika remains in the blood stream post infection? Are you immune once you've had it once? What are the risks to pregnant women a year after they have been infected?

But you are accusing a bunch of scientist,s just because they're from the US and a Canada, is doing the same thing you're accusing them of (except you have no proof, and in fact it probably has more to do with social connections and organizations than anything.)

If anything, I would be more skeptical if any Brazillian scientists said "It's fine, Zika is not a problem, come to the Olympics." Because as you said, Billions. (And note, I'm not saying this is happening, just explaining an idea).

Time is important, here, because scientists are racing the spread of Zika to develop eg vaccines.

[1] http://harvardpublichealthreview.org/off-the-podium-why-rios...

Considering Zika is rarely ever deadly (has anyone died from it yet?), what is the point of a vaccine? Just give everyone the disease (excluding pregnant woman of course).

I don't mean to suggest that it wouldn't be worth cancelling or changing if the health risk is so big, just that (like with climate change), humans have a disorder when it comes to this sort of thing.

Are you saying that Zika and hurricanes are not really a big deal but are made to seem so by the press... or that they are a big deal and the press poisons people against properly responding?

Without addressing the Olympics question directly, that question has 2 common and somewhat overlooked fallacies:

* That a current year has the most importance compared to previous years because of its sequence. If we consider how people have thought about their own current year we can see that they also have thought that their current year has the most importance.

* That progress has happened and that progress always occurs and moves in an upwards direction. I suggest that looking at history can give insights into how progress does not inexorably increase and improve year upon year. Initially it may appear nihilistic or anti-progress, but I believe thinking this way gives humans more insight into maintaining fragile societies and to ensure that our worlds do get better, through hard work, and not through some automatic procedure that works via the passage of years.

I hope this helps answer the question in a more helpful and better way.

Then there's the partners of male Olympic athletes (who might either visit to cheer on their partner or get it from sexual contact), tourists, etc.