Bellator MMA fighter Daiane Silva, who has remained in a London area hospital following a botched weight cut for September’s Bellator Champions Series 5, has showed signs of improvement.
In particular, the featherweight has displayed “increasing levels of consciousness this week,” per a report by Women’s MMA Rankings on Twitter, citing her management team.
According to that same report, the Professional Fighters League (PFL), who now own Bellator, will pay Silva her full fight purse for her would-be September 14 fight with Eman Almudhaf. The Bellator London card took place at the OVO Wembley in London, England, with Silva’s fight announced as cancelled, for reasons unknown at the time, by Bellator officials on weigh-in day.
Over a month later, news broke of Silva being in a coma following a weight-cut gone wrong. According to Women’s MMA Rankings, a family member was flown from Brazil to London by the PFL to be by her side.
Daiane Silva holds a 3-0 record in MMA, and trains with CM System in Curitiba, Brazil. Her three wins all came in the lightweight (155lb) division, with the September bout marking her first attempt to cut the extra ten pounds down to featherweight.
The incident has reignited debate about the dangerous practice of weight-cutting online. In 2015, ONE Championship’s Yang Jian Bing died at just 21-years old due to heart failure after a bad weight cut. The tragedy resulted in the company changing its weigh-in procedure, weight classes, and saw them add a hydration test for fighters. The UFC moved its weigh-in window to an earlier time the following year (2016), resulting in the now familiar “official” and “ceremonial” weigh-ins. The move was made to allow fighters additional time to rehydrate between their weight cut and fight.
