Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, February 24, 1995 TAG: 9502240100
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JIM LITKE|
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Now we come to learn it wasn't always courage propelling him from the edge of the board. Sometimes, it actually was the flip side of courage: recklessness.
That he has AIDS doesn't make Louganis any less admirable, only less cautious than we knew. Remember that because in the coming days, in conjunction with the release of Louganis' autobiography, ``Breaking The Surface,'' we are going to hear much from him, and about him. And there will be debate.
Some people will want to test everyone and ban from sports anyone with the HIV virus. Other people will insist infected athletes are obligated to no one but themselves.
Greg Louganis' sin was not keeping his disease a secret, nor in competing after he had contracted it. It was competing with the disease, but without letting all the people who might be affected know.
That was irresponsible. It could have been worse.
And if the rest of us fail to distinguish what was courageous from what was reckless about his behavior, then we will have learned nothing at all from his ordeal. And what an ordeal it has been.
His natural parents abandoned him. He was taunted by classmates because he is dyslexic and because of his Samoan heritage.
As a teen, he was tormented by depression, alcohol and the question of his own sexual orientation. He attempted suicide three times. Still, he overcame all of that to become the greatest diver in Olympic history.
By any measure, Louganis' story would have been compelling without the incident at its controversial core: his diving in the 1988 Seoul Olympics a full five months after he was found to be HIV positive.
As it turned out, everything went smoothly until his ninth dive in the preliminary round, when, attempting a reverse 21/2 pike, he struck his head on the board. His coach, Ron O'Brien, saw a trickle of blood.
``We got to the waiting room and, as the team doctor, Jim Puffer, started trying to find the wound, my thoughts were racing,'' Louganis writes in an excerpt from the book published in People magazine. ``Did I get any blood in the pool? Could I have infected Ron? Then I worried about Dr. Puffer, who wasn't wearing gloves. Was I putting him in danger?''
We now know the answer to the last two questions is no. O'Brien and Puffer, whom Louganis informed about his condition last year, have tested negative for the virus.
And a number of medical experts contend the question of whether Louganis spilled blood in the pool was a moot one. The small quantity of blood, its dilution in the water and the virus-killing potential of chlorine made the chances of infecting another diver infinitesimal.
In the interim, the International and U.S. Olympic committees - as well as virtually every professional and many amateur sporting leagues - have adopted strict guidelines regarding the treatment of athletes' bloodied in competition.
``There never has been a confirmed case of [HIV or AIDS] transmittal from one athlete to another during competition,'' said Dr. David Joyner of the USOC medical commission. ``That's not just the Olympics; that's all sports. That's an astounding number of people. ... So is it a significant problem for athletes? The statistics say it is not.''
There are any number of ways to rationalize, but ultimately, none of them absolves Louganis, or anyone else, of personal responsibility.
``Think back to 1988,'' said Richard Lapchick, director of Northeastern University's Center for the Study of Sport in Society. ``Greg was perceived at the time as a sex symbol. His career was on the rise and he probably had some friends who were gay and knew what revealing that had cost them. All of these things had to be weighing heavily on his keeping a secret, or at least clouding the right decision.
``That said, this is still the bottom line: In sports, like everything else, it's still an individual's responsibility to tell someone when they're in danger.''
That's what courage is really about.
Jim Litke is a sports columnist for The Associated Press.
by CNB