Stomach bug causes fears for Olympics athletes

Pyeongchang Olympic organizers were scrambling Wednesday to prevent an outbreak of the highly contagious norovirus spreading to athletes after the number of cases nearly tripled overnight.

No athletes are among the 86 confirmed cases so far and officials at the Winter Games say they are doing everything they can to ensure it stays that way, two days before the Olympics open.

Any illness spreading to the competitors -- particularly one of the star names -- would be a major embarrassment to hosts South Korea.

Underlining growing concerns about the spread of the stomach bug, which causes diarrhoea and vomiting, the Korean Centre for Disease Control and Prevention held a press conference to outline what steps it was taking.

"As of February 6 we had 32 cases, but today... we have an additional confirmed 54 cases so in total we have 86 cases of norovirus," said the center’s director Kim Hyun-Jun.

Among those were three from food preparation staff in the media village. The virus can be spread through food or water contamination.

Hundreds of soldiers have been drafted in to guard Olympic venues after 1,200 security staff were withdrawn and quarantined earlier this week over the outbreak.

The security guards, all employees of a security company, were staying together at a youth training center in Pyeongchang -- separate from the main Olympic sites -- believed to be epicenter of the virus.

Quarantining patients for 48-72 hours and rushing out hand sanitizers to venues are among the urgent measures officials have taken and American biathlon Lowell Bailey admitted that he had concerns.

SS