Fearing a dengue epidemic and worried about hygiene in Games village,Britains number one female tennis player Elena Baltacha on Sunday pulled out of the crisis-hit Commonwealth Games. Ranked 50 in the world,Elena was a medal hope in New Delhi but fearing about disease the Scot decided to cancel her trip to India considering it would be too high a risk for her. Elena said she saw the pictures of the filthy living conditions in the athletes quarters and read the reports about the outbreak of dengue and decided to skip the October 3-14 event. Its just the hygiene,the dengue fever,all that kind of stuff, Baltacha was quoted as saying in Daily Telegraph. It is a very high risk. But all the nations are still unhappy. Team Scotland are still pushing for things to be improved. Were talking about the Commonwealth Games,with athletes who are the best in the world,who have won gold at Olympics,who have competed at Olympics; its a pretty serious event and youd think that where youre meant to be staying,they would get that right,and they havent. Thats the most worrying thing,thats the thing weve seen and some of the stuff weve heard, she added. Elena suffers from a genetic liver condition that has left her immune system compromised and the Scot tennis star said it would be too high a risk. Meanwhile,Australian cyclist Travis Meyer and table tennis player Stephanie Sang on Sunday joined the growing list of athletes pulling out of the troubled Commonwealth Games in Delhi,citing security and health concerns. Withdrawal by Meyer and Sang took the number of Australian pullouts to three. Last week,discus world champion Dani Samuels was the first to skip the Games. Australian Commonwealth Games chief Perry Crosswhite dubbed the pullouts as disappointing.
