In spite of more than a year with a relative consensus around how COVID-19 spreads, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis believes that asymptomatic, coronavirus-positive NFL players should get the opportunity to play in their games.
During a press conference in Lakeland, DeSantis argued that players who test positive should be able to join their teams on the field if they are not experiencing symptoms. This flies in the face of everything we know about the virus and how it spreads.
“If somebody has had COVID and is vaccinated, all of these different things, then I’d hate to see them put out just for getting some type of asymptomatic, positive test,” he said. “So hopefully, they’ll have some rationality to that, and they’ll be full-strength every single day throughout the season.”
NFL rules around positivity are fairly lax for vaccinated players when compared to the 10-14 day quarantines in place in many other professions. Asymptomatic players can return to the team if they receive two negative tests within 24 hours. Symptomatic players must first stop exhibiting symptoms and then test negative twice in 48 hours.
Unvaccinated players who test positive must sit out for 10 days. They have to isolate for five days if they come into contact with a positive person, regardless of their own test results.
“I think we’ve learned now that these athletes, a lot of them even with fully vaccinated teams, are getting positive tests but they’re not getting seriously ill, so I think it’s going to be a really good season,” DeSantis said.
DeSantis has overseen one of the most negligent responses to coronavirus in the nation, with this state frequently accounting for one out of every four new cases during the Delta variant surge. Florida’s death toll is currently over 46,000 with thousands of deaths being added every week. Even with these embarrassing numbers, there’s some indication that the state is intentionally undercounting.
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This article appears in Sep 8-14, 2021.