THE new year means a fresh start, everybody starting from scratch, and a blank canvass for everyone to paint on.
For this new year though, it’s the aforementioned including Covid-19’s latest variant, Omicron.
For the sports world, it means coaches and players who are positive going into quarantine. Coaches and players who may have gotten in contact with an infected person entering Covid-19 protocols which means missing games, disrupting rhythms, momentum, game plans, strategies and substitution patterns.
Two words league officials, team executives, coaches and players don’t want to hear—cancellation and postponement.
According to Audie Cornish of npr.org, “In this era of Covid-19, sports have reflected the course of the pandemic in a very public way, from league shutdowns in March of 2020, signaling a closing of society at large, to rules and guidance about opening up venues. Now, sports are once again serving as an indicator. Infection rates are surging in major pro leagues, reflecting the rapid rise of cases in the general population.”
The ecosystem of sports will once again have to find ways and means to circumvent the surge. From the top league executive to sponsors and sports marketers and advertisers to the maintenance staff who keep the playing venues clean and spotless.
League commissioners will now have to worry about not just vaccinating their players, but giving them booster shots as well on top of the vaccination they’ve received already.
Back to npr.org, “You know, you look at those vaccination rates—almost every NHL player vaccinated, the NBA [National Basketball Association] reportedly at 97 percent. As of yesterday, the NFL said nearly 95 percent of players were vaccinated. Despite these safeguards, though, there are reasons why athletes may be more vulnerable to getting the virus, especially the highly transmissible omicron variant.”
Epidemiologist Zachary Binney adds, “If you’re an athlete and you’re playing for a team, you’re spending a lot of time together indoors, in meetings. You’re in the cafeteria eating together. It’s almost as much proximity as anybody working in any office job or restaurant job would have to each other in terms of being indoors and in close contact.”
Now back to the booster shots, more than 60 percent of players in the NBA are eligible to receive booster shots have received them already.
NPR.org says, “the NFL [National Football League] announced changes to its Covid-19 rules, tightening them up considerably. Effective immediately, masking regardless of vaccination status, meetings will be remote or outdoors, no in-person meals and no outside visitors on team travel. Zach Binney told me, hopefully, these kinds of enhanced protocols, along with more booster shots, can keep the NFL and other leagues operating during this current surge.”
Look for sports leagues to not take any chances and strictly enforce their respective protocols. From vaccinations, they’ll now be looking at booster shots.
Here in our shores, because of the Omicron variant, the ongoing Philippine Basketball Association season has grinded to a halt and the respective seasons of the University Athletic Association of the Philippines and the National Collegiate Athletic Association are now in limbo.
National sports associations will have to add another layer in their respective training bubbles in addition to adding more protocols.
For sports to survive the latest uptick of cases, everyone has to voluntarily cooperate.
Moving forward, all decisions must be guided by both medicine and science.