Wrestling-U.S. wrestling pulls team from world championships

Oct 21 (Reuters) - The United States will not send a team to Serbia for the wrestling world championships in December over health and safety concerns caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, said USA Wrestling.

The USA Wrestling executive committee voted unanimously on Tuesday not to participate at the Dec. 12-20 event in Belgrade.

"After reviewing updated medical, scientific and government data, and providing an opportunity for athlete and stakeholder input, the executive committee concluded that it would not be in the best interest of all involved to organize a delegation to travel to and participate in the Senior World Championships in Serbia," said Bruce Baumgartner, USA Wrestling president, in a statement.

In making the decision USA Wrestling noted that world wrestling's governing body, the United World Wrestling (UWW) had already canceled the 2020 junior world championships, also scheduled for December in Belgrade and that the senior worlds were the only world championships event left on the 2020 calendar that had not been canceled.

"Based upon the current medical and scientific information concerning the status of COVID-19 worldwide, including the current surge in cases, hospitalizations and deaths at the international level, it would be ill-advised to place the U.S. delegation at risk by attending this competition," said Dr. Bernard Feldman, a long-time physician with USA Wrestling and UWW. (Reporting by Steve Keating in Toronto. Editing by Giles Elgood)