Milos Raonic out of Rio games, blames Zika

The world’s seventh-ranked tennis player joins several of his elite athlete brethren in skipping the Rio games.

It won’t be getting easier for Team Canada. Per Sports Illustrated and his Facebook post:

"“It is with a heavy heart that I am announcing my withdrawal from participation in the Rio 2016 Olympic Games,” Raonic wrote. “After much deliberation with my family and coaches, I am making this decision for a variety of health concerns including the uncertainty around the Zika virus.”"

That another athlete would drop out of the Olympics due to Zika is not surprising. That the games are being held in Rio at all, given all the water quality problems that were known about ahead of time, is what is surprising.

As far back as 2014, Brazilian officials were being questioned about the quality of the water in Rio. Some of the concerns began with debris in the water and whether or not that would affect sailing teams. Over time, the concerns began to spread as water quality testing revealed that not only is the water polluted with debris—it’s polluted with disease, as well. More than one year ago, officials had identified the contaminated water as ‘dangerous.’ Yet—here we are.

What if you were a swimmer being asked to swim through raw sewage? Too much? Still cool? You okay with getting sick and potentially having the future of your family altered in order to compete for a piece of hardware?

The 2014 World Cup was a major disaster by economic proportions. Although there did not appear to be any water-related concerns outside of shortages, Brazil was plunged into massive debt by the building of many unnecessary soccer stadiums.

The government was shown to be incompetent at handling such an event and the fallout from it—that was probably clue #1 that they weren’t going to be able to complete their massive project to reduce the contamination in the water. It also was the first hint that they might not be able to pay for it, either. Especially since, you know, they admitted it two years ago.

When you add all of this up, you can see that we’re probably about to have the most disastrous Olympics on record, all because of the inability of government officials to be honest with themselves about what is possible, and their reckless disregard for human safety. Shame on the IOC for allowing this to continue in this manner, and good for Milos Raonic.