Athletes have dismissed the dangers of swimming in Rio de Janeiro's dirty waters next year, saying the risks are not great enough to alter their Olympic plans.
Despite a warning from a state environmental agency that some Olympic venues are unsafe, triathletes entered the waters off Copacabana Beach on Friday in an area considered "unfit" for swimming. They'll continue to compete this weekend in test events for next year's games.
"We know we are exposed to viruses, maybe to health problems later," Costa Rican triathlete Leonardo Chacon said.
"But in my case, I have invested so much to prepare myself for this and I want this to happen because I can't recuperate this investment any other way other than competing and winning the points that I need to win."
There will be spots available for the 2016 Olympics in Sunday's triathlon test event in Rio. And the test events provide a unique opportunity to get to know the environment.
"For me, the greater risk would be not knowing the course," said American paratriathlete Patricia Walsh, who was getting familiarised with the venue that will be used in triathlon's debut in the Paralympic Games next year.
"For any athlete, getting in the water, any water, has its own amount of risk. If I didn't do that, I think it would be a greater risk than going in the water."
The Rio de Janeiro environmental agency said the water was declared unfit based on the results of a water test earlier this week.
The same spot, which is near where triathletes began swimming, has been declared unfit 10 previous times this year alone.
Officials publicly insisted athletes were safe and stuck to the competition schedule. Later in the day, Rodrigo Garcia, the sports director for the local Olympic organising committee, said that new, unpublished water test results show that the area is suitable for the competition, but provided no details on the results.
On Thursday, The Associated Press released the results of a five-month investigation that showed that Olympic venues are rife with disease-causing viruses and bacteria.
The AP study showed that the spot where athletes were entering the water on Copacabana Beach had a minimal reading of over 2 million human adenovirus per litre - that's 2,000 times the reading that water experts in the US or Europe would consider highly alarming.
Human adenovirus multiply in the intestinal and respiratory tracts of people. These are viruses that are known to cause respiratory and digestive illnesses, including explosive diarrhoea and vomiting, but can also lead to more serious heart, brain and other diseases.
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