The world ‘best’ and most-watched league, the English Premier League, is the latest football league to be suspended, as the coronavirus pandemic continues to wreak havoc around the world.
The news of the Premier league being suspended, was one that virtually everyone saw coming, given the rate at which the virus has been spreading, with the increasing numbers of players and managers confirming a positive status.
The report on Friday by the FA, stated that all elite football in England has been suspended until at least 3 April 2020, as a result of the spread of coronavirus.
These includes, all Premier League games, EFL fixtures and matches in the FA Women’s Super League and Women’s Championship have been postponed.
The news without a doubt, is a sad one, especially for sports fans, but it is also a welcome development as if there is any way the world can stop or defeat this menace that has been declared a global pandemic, is for people and authorities to take adequate measures that can help to stop the spread, and this is surely one of them.
The more people stop moving around, and gather in numbers without precautions, the more the virus spread!..
Before the suspension of the Premier League on Friday, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Thursday touched on the possibilities of banning events of huge gatherings, amid the coronavirus outbreak.
While speaking on the plans on Thursday, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the UK will move to the “delay” phase of its plan to tackle the virus.
There have been 596 confirmed cases across the UK, and 10 deaths.
“We are considering banning major public events like sporting fixtures,” said Johnson.
“The scientific advice is this has little effect on the spread – but it does place a burden on other public services.”
Johnson added: “We are guided by the science; there is no medical reason at the moment to ban such events.
“We are not saying no to that sort of measure, we are keeping it up our sleeves. But it is very, very important in order to maximise our interventions that we get the timing right.”
Chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance said cancelling sporting events is not a “major way to tackle this epidemic”.
“Of course there is a risk,” he said. “But on average one person infects two or three others.
“You, therefore, have a very low probability of infecting a large number of people in a stadium, or a rather higher probability of infecting people very close to you, and that means most of the transmission tends to take place with friends and colleagues in close environments, not in the big environments.
“It is true that any cancellations of things can have some effect (but) if you then get a displacement activity, when everyone congregates somewhere else, you may have perversely an increased risk, particularly in an indoors environment.
“So it doesn’t mean you should at some point make the decision for the resilience point that has been discussed, but this is not a major way to tackle this epidemic.
“The major ways are to try and reduce and delay the transmission across households and people who have become infected and that why that is the concentration of the first actions.”