James GordonSaturday’s soccer season opener between California’s Golden Bears and Washington’s Huskies was canceled after a Cal player tested positive at COVID-19 and several teammates were quarantined as close as possible, the school said Thursday.
According to a statement from the school, Cal Athletics followed instructions for contact tracing, quarantine, symptom management and treatment of infectious diseases within the University of Berkeley Medical Service and the Berkeley Health Service. As a result, several football students are quarantined for contact tracing.
Berkeley’s Ministry of Health demands that anyone who comes into close contact with a COVID-19-positive be placed in quarantine for 14 days at home or any other place of residence, which raises questions about the bears’ ability to survive day 14 of the quarantine. November in Arizona.
I’d like to know if Cal’s coach, Justin Wilcox, said they’ll probably play against the DIA. It’s not my decision. It’s not Cal’s football, it’s definitely not our players’ decision. The Ministry of Health of Berkeley is investigating this issue and is looking for contacts. If they have negative results, they can come back and join us.
The player who tested positive is a lineman, several sources told ESPN, although it is not clear which side of the ball is involved. Anyway, when Cal couldn’t use all his group positions, he couldn’t play.
It’s the [position group] you can’t live without, Wilcox said.
Mr Wilcox made it clear that Berkeley’s determination to quarantine the whole position group and contacts other than close contacts was a disappointing decision because he felt the team had done everything possible to avoid close contacts.
We’ve built things along those lines, positional exercises, team exercises, Wilcox said. Again, I think that part is difficult to swallow because the players and our sports department, the coaches, everyone tried to do everything they could with the information we had. And unfortunately, it didn’t really help because they were always looking. They don’t tell us about these specific scenarios.
In addition to a confirmed positive result that remains asymptomatic, all quarantine workers have continued to test negative for the virus, Wilcox said.
Berkeley’s public health spokesperson told ESPN that negative test results would prevent quarantine because the incubation period for COVID-19 would be 14 days.
The reason for the 14-day quarantine is the length of time a person can develop the disease, Mattai Chakko, a public health spokesperson for Berkeley, told ESPN. A [negative test] does not cure a person’s COVID-19 syndrome or eliminates the possibility of a virus. The quarantine order is based on this principle.
The start of quarantine may vary from player to player, depending on when they are identified as being in close contact with a player found to be positive, and the school tries to understand how the orders are applied in each case.
According to Chakko, the Ministry of Health has determined, on the basis of interviews with participants in the football programme, who should be placed in quarantine.
We interview [the person who tested positive], who that person was with, how long they were with them and under what conditions, Chakko said. And on the basis of these surveys, you will begin to determine with whom you are conducting the other surveys and determine how long each person is with you and whether he or she meets the public health thresholds.
Mr Wilcox said he was not sure there was a way to quarantine one of his players based on the existing information the school had received from the health service, and described some of the measures the school had taken to ensure a safe atmosphere for the return to play.
We’ve built this whole process with the help of our sports medicine staff and our university, based on guidelines we’ve received from the state and local health authorities to (a) reduce the risk and virus, which we all take seriously, and (b) trace the contacts, Wilcox said. When they get to the stadium, there are points where they have to do the tests. When we meet, we’re in the room and they’re two meters away.
When they go out in the field, they don’t go in the locker room. They have cushions on the side, we don’t share bottled water. All these measures have been taken on the basis of risk reduction guidelines issued by public health and local health authorities and a contact tracing element. And unfortunately, that wasn’t enough. So we will wait to find out more, tomorrow or this weekend, depending on their availability.
The game is declared non-competitive under the Pac-12 policy.
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