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WASHINGTON, Feb. 9 — Astronauts will delay by one day attaching a European science laboratory to the International Space Station because of an undisclosed health problem with one member of the space shuttle Atlantis’ seven-man crew, NASA officials said Saturday.

John Shannon, chairman of NASA’s Mission Management Team, disclosed the problem and delay during a televised briefing from the Johnson Space Center in Houston. However, citing privacy issues, he refused to disclose the nature of the medical issue or the astronaut involved.

“It’s not life threatening,” Mr. Shannon said. Although astronauts in space have had health problems in the past, he said this was the first time he could recall such an incident affecting plans during a mission.

Atlantis, which took off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Thursday, docked with the space station shortly after noon Eastern time on Saturday.

Mr. Shannon said the crew requested two private medical conferences with flight surgeons at about the same time, and shortly afterward mission control advised astronauts on both craft that a Sunday spacewalk would be delayed and that a different crewman would be involved.

Stanley G. Love will replace Hans Schlegel, a European Space Agency astronaut from Germany, on the delayed spacewalk. Mr. Love, who has been trained as Mr. Schlegel’s backup, will join Col. Rex J. Walheim of the Air Force in attaching the Columbus laboratory carried by Atlantis to the station, officials said.

Mr. Shannon would not say if the medical issue involved Mr. Schlegel or if the German astronaut would be conducting a second spacewalk for which he is scheduled. Mr. Schlegel, 56, has been an astronaut since 1990 and flew on a 1993 space shuttle mission.

The delay in installing the $2 billion Columbus module, Europe’s primary contribution to the space station, will add at least one day to Atlantis’s planned 11-day mission, Mr. Shannon said.

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