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WHO Now Says You Should Wait Twice as Long to Have Sex After Visiting Areas With Zika

The new guidelines follow evidence that the virus lingers longer than previously thought in the body fluids of infected people. They come three days after WHO refused to back calls to postpone this year’s Olympics because of Brazil's Zika outbreak.
Photo via Salvatore Di Nolfi/EPA

The World Health Organization has doubled the time it recommends that people practice safe sex, or abstain from sex altogether, after returning from areas where the Zika virus is found.

The new recommendations come three days after the WHO rejected calls by international experts to join them in urging the postponement of this year's Olympic Games in Rio de Janiero because of concerns about the prevalence of the virus in the Brazilian city.

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The mosquito-born virus is linked to serious developmental problems in newborns and has also been shown to be transmitted through sex.

The WHO had previously advised anybody who had been in a place where the virus is present to exercise sexual caution for four weeks.

The new recommendation of eight weeks comes after scientists found the virus lingers longer than previously thought in blood or other body fluids, spokesman Christian Lindmeier told a news briefing. He added that the period of safe abstinence should be six months if the male partner in a couple planning pregnancy has symptoms of the Zika virus.

The new guidelines "reflect what we have learned about Zika disease and its complications," he said.

Asked if this new advice amounted to an effective ban on pregnancies in Brazil, where the virus first appeared a year ago, Lindmeier said that "the guidance is to delay or consider delaying pregnancy, certainly recognizing that this is tough for some populations."

The spokesman said scientists are still investigating how long the virus can be traced in saliva but these tests have so far been inconclusive.

The announcement on safe sex came on the heels of the WHO's Saturday rejection of a call made by over 100 experts for the Rio Olympic Games to be moved or postponed due to the threat posed by the particularly acute epidemic of the virus in Brazil.

In a public letter posted online on Friday, around 150 leading public health experts, many of them bioethicists, said the risk of infection from the Zika virus was too high for the Games to go ahead safely.

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The letter, sent to the WHO director-general Margaret Chan, said the Games should be moved to another location or delayed.

Related: International Health Experts Want Rio's Olympic Games Postponed Because of Zika

"An unnecessary risk is posed when 500,000 foreign tourists from all countries attend the Games, potentially acquire that strain, and return home to places where it can become endemic," the letter said.

But the WHO rejected the call, saying Brazil is one of dozens of territories where Zika has been detected and that people continued to travel between all of them for a variety of reasons.

"Based on the current assessment of Zika virus circulating in almost 60 countries globally and 39 in the Americas, there is no public health justification for postponing or canceling the games," the WHO said in a statement. "The best way to reduce risk of disease is to follow public health travel advice."

One of the signatories of the letter, brain injury specialist Dr. Ford Vox, called the WHO's response "defeatist, depressing, and quite a bit too quick for anyone to believe they gave the letter due consideration."

The International Olympic Committee jumped into the debate by saying the WHO's response was not made in consultation with the Olympic body. It also denied there was a "secret" memorandum of understanding between the WHO and IOC.

Related: Rio Has Three Times More Zika Cases Than Any Other State in Brazil

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The IOC has said it was monitoring the development of Zika through the WHO for up-to-date information and guidance but has repeatedly said the virus would not pose a threat to the Games.

The scientific community is divided over the threat of Zika due to the Rio Olympics, with many experts saying the call for postponement or relocation is unjustified.

"We live in an incredibly interconnected world, global travel and trade are daily activities that offer Zika virus an opportunity to spread," said Jonathan Ball, professor of molecular virology at the U.K.'s University of Nottingham. "By comparison to these routine activities, the increased risk that the Olympics poses is a drop in the ocean."

Prior to this week's new recommendations, the WHO was already advising pregnant women not to travel to areas with Zika virus transmission, including Rio de Janeiro. It had also already advised everyone to wear long sleeves and use insect repellent, to protect themselves against mosquito bites, and to practice safe sex.

The Rio Olympic Committee announced last week that it will be distributing 450,000 condoms during the competition — three times the number provided during the 2012 London Games.

Related: The Olympics Won't Be Cancelled Over Zika, So Keep It in Your Pants and Use Bug Spray

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