Huh ... why did that put me in mind of the young Lauren Bacall? I haven't done a match since HS shut down here back in March. Very much of mixed emotions about that (probably not least because today I am embarking upon my 70th year on this mortal coil). Today's email harvest brought the 2021 recert info from our HS association. That recert will be entirely virtual. The games, of course, will not. Me: "Am I gonna do high school games this spring?" Wife: "Yes."
Tomorrow and Wednesday night, I'll do a few games in my local indoor complex. Games will be on a portion of the full field and with a high ceiling. Not much running, so I'll use an electronic whistle and wear a mask.
Wouldn’t have passed MA rules this fall: any breath-powered whistle was supposed to be inside a mask. OK if you zipped the whistle inside the mask before blowing, though.
I may actually only do school ball from here on out. HS here is late August-early November. All in the early evenings with a few Saturdays thrown in. At most two games in a row (usually JV dual then varsity AR, if you are the varsity Center you get to show up after the JV game). I did not miss all day weekend tournaments during the nice warm weather. I'd rather duck out of work an hour or two early, do a game or two, and get home by 9 on a weekday than lose my whole weekend. In my experience, telling an assigner "I could do one or two games Sunday morning" turns into getting begged to stay for a few more. It also helps that high school games are the highest level sub-college games we have in my (small) state. The few premier club teams there are usually head out of state to play.
Today was the last day of my HS regular season. Despite our local association being down to about 90 referees from 120-130 or so last year, I ended up working the same exact number of games this regular season as last regular season (63).
This is my first year doing HS. From the email count, we had 61 last season. By my math we have 37 now, but that is only the ones who showed up to the first meeting. There may be more, but Dragonfly doesn't list the officials like Arbiter and GameOfficials does.
WaPo article today: "Are youth sports an engine of B.1.1.7 outbreaks?" "Dan Culhane, 62, took extraordinary precautions when he returned to the ice as a youth hockey referee in January. He triple-masked, wore a plexiglass face shield on his helmet and donned his gear at home to minimize time indoors. "It wasn’t enough. "Culhane, who died on Feb. 28 of covid-19, is one of more than 189 people confirmed or suspected to be linked to an unusual youth sports outbreak of the coronavirus in Carver County, Minn., driven by the B.1.1.7 variant that was first seen in the United Kingdom. The interlinked cases span all levels of K-12 schools, from elementary to high school, and 18 hockey, four basketball, three lacrosse and one soccer teams." More at: https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/04/06/youth-sports-outbreaks-covid-testing/
On the positive, I used my position as a school referee as a 'school contractor' to make myself eligible for vaccination a few weeks earlier and received my second shot 9 days ago. Did my 1st HS game of our 'fall 2' season a couple weeks ago on a Monday night. I get home from my MLSNext matches that Saturday to a phone call from my school assignor. One of the kids on the HS game tested positive a few days later and I was then quarantined from refereeing for 10 days and taken off a couple school games. Luckily they ended up being played in some shitty rain/snow conditions, so if there was a bright side, I missed out on that. Was back on the field this past Monday. Part that made zero sense, I was quarantined (as was my partner), the school with the positive test was quarantined from playing, naturally, the opponent however was not quarantined.
There is a whole lot of Covid-related decisions that have made zero sense. My company allows me to work out of town in my usual office, but I can't work out of town at other offices to be closer to schools where I have games, even though I have worked in those offices before.
In my case, it's depended on what leagues are active. I'm probably doing more than usual right now because of the college season getting moved. Overall, I've gotten a similar number of games from USSF and high school but missed out on NPSL, UPSL and USL 2.
I'm guessing the referee-imposed quarantine has more to do with our membership (and their households) that tends to trend older (and therefore riskier). At 53, I'm one of the young guys.
Los Angeles County health order, effective Sept 1, appears to require testing within 48 hours for all participants In youth soccer games—I don’t see how that is going to be practicable.
Regardless of vaccination status. (It's recommended that unvaccinated participants get tested twice weekly.)
Are they allowing the instant tests or requiring the send-to-the-lab test? Around here, it's a crapshoot whether you get the send-in results back within 48 hrs. HSVG game earlier this week... Girls at home vs. 'X', Boys were away at 'X'. At halftime, i see the home boys team stroll into the stands to watch the girls. Huh? Thought they were playing at 'X' tonight? "Their game got cancelled because of covid at X's school." Oh, really? Then why the h*** did X's girls team still come here to play?!? SMH...
For the NCAA track & field championships and the Olympic Trials, I had to be tested seven times in June, despite being fully vaxxed. All negative, of course. Ignoring whether you are vaccinated or not doesn't give one much incentive to get vaxxed, does it? If a school can't field a team, we are treating any non-league game as just cancelled, i.e. not affecting their win-lost record. Any league game will be a forfeit, however, and season records will be affected. This is more than paper wins and losses because forfeit wins and losses will affect your ranking and may determine whether you make the playoffs or not. People who are fully vaxxed and asymptomatic do not have to quarantine if they are exposed, under our state's policy. YMMV.
I think they must be allowing the instant tests for exactly that reason--but I'm still dubious about there being a practical solution for AYSO. Hopeful, but dubious. and trying to avoid letting depression set in . . .
I think that policy is starting to change in some places as, apparently, even those of us who are fully vaxxed can be asymptomatic spreaders. I think that is the logic of the LA County order. While I find it depressing, I really can't say it is clearly erroneous from a health policy perspective such that VAR should intervene. The policy doesn't kick in until the first, so I may get a game or tow in to satisfy my addiction even if I have to go cold turkey again.
Limiting to only youth sports? Why not college and pro sports? Do pro athletes not contract and spread the virus? How many athletes, no matter what age, have been hospitalized?
Vaccines are not approved for youth yet and the Delta variant has shown to be a greater risk for kids than the initial outbreak. Pro and College players who are vaccinated can still be re-infected but have a much lower chance of having a severe case.
OK. But again, How many athletes, no matter what age, have been hospitalized with Covid? The high school I do the radio play by play for has had several students test positive in the last 18 months. According to them, zero have been hospitalized. At worst, some had mild symptoms.
The CDC reports that about 450 children (I'm sure at least some of them were athletes) in the US have died from Covid. Yes, a very low rate; children seem to have much milder symptoms as well. The danger is that the child brings the virus home and it spreads to parents or grandparents.
Vaccine promo… At this point from what we know about the vaccines (for the sake of this discussion I’m referring to Pfizer and moderna), delta variant etc., if you are not vaccinated, then you are an unnecessary burden and risk to everyone around you. The demographics have changed abruptly: COVID is no longer the disease of the elderly and sick- ICU’s across the country are full of people who are young to middle age adults with no risk factors, except one: they are not vaccinated. Most places the unvaccinated makes up 90-95% of the inpatient population, and 95-99% of deaths in the last three months. Vaccine reactions in the young and old are occurring, but the incidence is not dissimilar to reactions to other vaccines: they are real, can be occasionally severe, and numerically are rare enough that they should not be part of one’s decision making. For example, the odds of a young person getting myocarditis from the vaccine is about the same as he or she having sudden cardiac death while playing sports. Burden wise, we are a hair’s breadth away from the peaks of last winter: er wait times are dramatic, and are limiting access to people with non-COVID emergencies. It’s not that delta is that much more severe as the original strains (it is at least as severe tho), it’s that the infectivity is so high that it is sweeping through vulnerable (ie unvaccinated and COVID naive) groups. To be sure, delta has meant that people are getting COVID for the second (or third) time, and a vaccinated person can likely still spread it. But if everyone were vaccinated, the hospitals’ COVID burden would be extremely manageable. I’m not so sure that COVID testing is the answer here: it has a feel of closing the barn doors after the horses have all run out. It is not impractical to do testing with the point of care tests: a 95% sensitive test that can be done in minutes costs $6. The soccer pertinent part is that it is increasingly obvious that covid most efficiently trasmits when people linger together in small spaces with poor ventilation. I don’t know what the transmission rate is during soccer practice or games, but i bet it is quite low. I personally do not use any extra precautions during games except keeping my distance.