PIAA committee meets to discuss coronavirus, future of high school sports

As the number of cases of the coronavirus continues to rise in Pennsylvania and across the country, the PIAA Sports Medicine Advisory Committee met — over conference call — to discuss how the pandemic will affect high school sports for the future, among other topics, on Sunday.

Executive director Bob Lombardi said the PIAA intends to follow recommendations provided from the governor’s office, and that the decisions made are going to reflect current information and not based on any “what ifs.” As a result, there have been no decisions yet regarding fall sports with attention focused primarily on the winter championships and “starting discussion of spring events.”

“We do have our eye on the fall — I will tell you this: I’ve been in contact with a number of state associations and they’re all trying to do a similar item where they’ve suspended things and trying to get current information before they take the next step and they’re doing it in a progressive standard too," Lombardi told the committee. “We are concerned about the fall.”

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The PIAA suspended its basketball and swimming championships for at least two weeks and has not yet said if the suspension is going to last longer than the two-week period or if they could be canceled altogether.

Lombardi said that one of the challenges currently facing the PIAA regarding the future of sports in the state is whether facilities and schools will even allow people on their campuses, saying that some have already said they do want visitors on their campus if they do reopen.

“I don’t want to get too far upfield with conjecture because we simply don’t know at this time and I would like to follow the facts of what the governor does instead of saying, ‘what if,’” Lombardi said. “Because once you put something out on a ‘what if’, it sorta sticks to people and it could be changed because of the circumstances.”

The day after the PIAA suspended the remaining winter championships, Gov. Tom Wolf announced that all K-12 schools in Pennsylvania would be closed for 10 business days in response to the coronavirus, encompassing the entirety of the PIAA’s two-week time frame.

Wolf’s decision means that schools are prohibited from having any activities on campus, including athletic competitions or practices. Lombardi said he is aware that some schools will take that to mean that practice and workouts off campus will be permissible but said that on Monday, he intends to send to all members of the PIAA Board that schools are not going to be allowed to practice during the 10-day suspension of school.

“We’re going to work together with this because I think if people try to gamesmanship, they only add to the potential spread and everybody is working in good faith trying to keep people safe,” Lombardi said.

The committee was also relayed information about the virus from Dr. Matthew Silvis from PennState Health at the Milton S. Hershey Medical Center. Silvis said that they are expecting a surge of cases in central Pennsylvania and across the state in the next one to two weeks due to an increase in test kits distributed throughout the week.

He said the surge is not necessarily because people are newly symptomatic, but rather because testing will become more available.

The number of cases in the state already rose to 63 as of Sunday morning, with a majority coming from Montgomery County. Only five have come from central Pennsylvania, all having been found in Cumberland County.

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Silvis highlighted the dangers of the coronavirus, noting that it has a mortality rate of 15 percent for those over the age of 80 years old, and said it is possible for people to show no symptoms — not just mild symptoms — to still be carriers of the virus.

“There are people that are asymptomatic getting tests in South Korea, and the concern is that there is some segment of the population that will have the virus that will have no symptoms, not just mild symptoms, but no symptoms and still shed the virus and other people then could still pick up that virus,” Silvis said over the phone. “That is a real, definite concern.”

Regarding how the virus could continue to affect PIAA sports, Silvis said there are two types of the coronavirus that are known to survive in warmer, more humid climates and two that do not. There is no sign yet to indicate what will happen with COVID-19 during the spring and summer, but said that if it is sensitive to heat and humidity, “there will be another spike in the fall.”

He also said that droplets of the virus can survive on surfaces for days and that it can survive on a table that has been disinfected for up to two more hours.

Pat Gebhart, assistant executive director of the PIAA, asked if there are any particular precautions officials should take if sports resume in the spring.

Silvis responded that they not make physical contact with anyone and should try to stay outside of three to six feet of anyone who is actively coughing — if that player isn’t pulled from the game. He also said that they should drink from their own water bottle and use proper handwashing techniques.

“It’s hard even to remember where we were at a week ago in terms of environment because of how much it changed just over the past week and I suspect we’ll all be saying that again next weekend: how much more impact this will have a week from today than it had over the past week,” Silvis said. "It’s so dynamic and fluid that it’s hard to predict. It’s like saying it’s hard to predict today what it’s going to look like tomorrow.”

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