BellyitchBlog

In a travel advisory Friday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reiterated that pregnant women consider not going to the 2016 Summer Olympic Games or to the 2016 Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro because of the Zika virus outbreak in Brazil.

The agency issued the travel advisory along with its first report about infection with the mosquito-borne Zika virus in pregnant U.S. women. While the illness caused by the Zika virus is usually mild, the Brazilian outbreak has been especially concerning because of its link to a sharp rise in cases of microcephaly, a birth defect characterized by brain abnormalities and an unusually small head.

“We know Zika and microcephaly are associated, although we do not yet have definitive proof that Zika infection alone is the cause of microcephaly,” CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden said at a press briefing, adding that “the evidence for this is getting stronger by the day.”

In September, retired US Gymnastics and Olympic medalist, Dominique Dawes gave her followers a clue into the fact that she was pregnant when she tweeted herself filming a video for Kaiser Permanente.

Not everyone got it and only one of her followers responded to the image with a “hmmm.”

Dawes, who is the only modern American gymnast to compete and medal in three Olympic games (1992, 1996, 2000), has been the health organization’s Health Advocate and official spokeswoman for several years now, but when she began to show, she started to help promote its prenatal care program among patients and in communities.

Twitter

But in that September photo, she was much smaller than when she first openly shared news of her first pregnancy this past December in a photo (below) which also shows the petite Maryland-native wearing a wedding and engagement ring.

The motivational speaker is quite secretive about her private life so no one had a clue she was even married, let alone expecting!

Dawes, who was a member of the US Gymnastics Olympic Overall Gold medalist team at the Atlanta 1996 games, posted a video from the campaign on her Twitter account recently.

“Prenatal health is the first step to being a good mom!” the alumnus of University of Maryland (my alma mater) wrote.

Olympics

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BumpWatch: Dominique Dawes promotes Kaiser Permanente’s Prenatal Care campaign (VIDEO)