The pandemic puts a spanner in the works at the Miss World pageant once again. After the cancellation last year, the final to crown the queen of 2021, scheduled in Puerto Rico, has been postponed because at least 23 of the 97 competitors tested positive for Covid-19. The event on the Caribbean island, a live TV show that would have marked the culmination of weeks of dating with the most beautiful girls in the world as protagonists, skipped at the last moment, a few hours before the start of the show. Health authorities reported that 38 positive cases associated with the contest, 15 staff members and 23 contestants were detected. And at that point the organizers of the evening decided to postpone. Because at this moment, they stressed, “the interest in the health and safety of the competitors, of the staff, of the staff of the general public” must prevail.
The goal is to reschedule the event within 90 days. Among the positive misses, the competitor from Malaysia, Lavanya Sivaji, who was placed in isolation, even if asymptomatic. Worse went to Miss Indonesia, Pricilia Carla Yules, who then explained on Instagram that she was “in the recovery phase” and “felt much better physically and mentally”, after a more complicated phase. Both, together with all the other infected, will have to observe a period of quarantine and once they are authorized by health officials, they will be able to return to their countries.
In the meantime, with the postponement of the 2021 final and the cancellation of the 2020 edition, again due to the coronavirus, the scepter of the most beautiful of the realm still remains in the hands of the 2019 winner, Jamaican Toni-Ann Singh. While waiting to celebrate the next queen, the stop of Miss World in Puerto Rico was however a negative sign. If we consider that this US territory has been a model for the real American states, boasting a percentage of the population vaccinated at 80%, much higher than the average.