The College of Sports has recorded at least 6,629 virus cases

More than 6,600 college athletes, coaches, and employees have tested Coronavirus This year, it’s a disappointing measure of how far the pathogen has reached across the United States and has spread among some of the nation’s most watched people.

At least 6,629 people who play and work in sports divisions that compete in the college football Premier League have been infected with the virus, according to an analysis by The New York Times. The vast majority of these injuries have been reported since August 15, as players, coaches and staff around them prepare for the fall semester. Including football season.

The actual number of cases is certainly much higher than what The Times shows, the most comprehensive general measure of the virus in college sports. The Times has managed to collect full data on just 78 of the 130 universities in the football subsection of the National Athletics Association, the highest level in college football. Some of these schools released epidemic statistics only in response to requests made under public records laws.

The remaining schools, many of them public institutions, did not release any statistics or limited information about their sports departments, or stopped providing data just before the soccer season. This had the effect of painting a veil of secrecy around college sports during the most serious public health crisis in the United States in a century.

There is no math department sharing data I have reported any virus-related deaths, A prevalence that the NCAA has not tracked in its member schools.

“We felt there was nothing to hide,” said Barry Alvarez, the sporting director of Wisconsin. Wisconsin has recorded at least 112 cases in athletics. Missed consecutive football matches during the outbreak A third match – against Minnesota – was canceled due to issues within its program. Alvarez said: “We felt that it was in our interest and in the interest of everyone to publish accurate information, especially if we had to cancel a game, so that you would not have rumors or misinformation.”

Cases in sports sections are only a fraction of those In a country that has recorded more than 15 million injuries – more than any nation. However, they are collectively demonstrating how a virus can intrude programs even when they have strict security protocols, including large-scale testing. In fact, the Big Ten Conference, which required athletes and coaches to take daily exams, was the most notorious case of any higher league and had some of the worst outbreaks of college sports.

Raw digital numbers such as those provided by universities cannot reveal the origin of any single infection or group of cases. An athlete can easily catch the virus from a friend or relative rather than a teammate. And experts believe that almost none of the injuries in college sports are related to the games themselves. Instead, it can often be traced back to meetings, meals, travel, or non-sporting activities that then lead to the seed of cases.

But it is also true that the university sports industry, hampered in part by a particularly acute fragmented system of governance in football, has developed little in common with a strategy to combat the risks of the pandemic.

Test criteria vary from conference to conference. So do the league’s policies regarding things like whether spectators can attend matches, how to bring back players who have been sidelined by the virus, and when teams can postpone them. Or cancel games. The NCAA has health guidelines, but many of them are just recommendations.

A questionnaire National Athletic Coaches Federation released In September it found that not even half of them did not believe that coaches and staff in all college sports were “fully compliant” with virus safety protocols. University leaders have kept their deliberations hidden from public opinion.

The NCAA, whose limited authority over its federations and schools has often been evident during the pandemic, said in a statement to The Times that “medical data is governed by a variety of federal regulations and state regulations, and for this reason, access and use are at an institutional level.”

She added that more than ten of its members have shared information with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention “for the purpose of a better understanding of resettlement as it relates to quarantine and testing.”

However, the data compiled by The Times shows at least some of the consequences and risks of a porous, multibillion-dollar sports network that is centered on college campuses. Although five members withheld the full data, schools in the Big Ten, which includes 14 universities, have collectively admitted at least 1,850 injuries, the most of any league.

Minnesota reported 336 cases in its athletic department, more than any other FBS school, including 176 in November alone. The state of Iowa, which is also a member of the Big Ten, has tested 330 positive.

Although the Big Ten has battled the virus, particularly with the outbreak spreading through its Midwestern footprint, the data shows at least the partial extent of the conflicts in the sporting divisions of other leagues.

The sports departments of the Big 12 conference, which has 10 schools, for example, have registered at least 1,357 cases. Although, most of the members Southeast ConferenceThe University Football League, which many people fear, respect and abuse equally, has refused to provide full data, and The Times has found at least 587 cases in its sports departments.

Members of the Pac-12 conference – the last Power Five conferences to start the soccer season – have reported 357 cases within athletics, and Atlantic Coast Conference Schools revealed 809.

Few of the sports departments reported only the number of positive tests, not the unique cases, which means that it is possible that some individuals have been counted multiple times. Other schools have not specified whether they prepare exams or cases. The Times excluded all numbers from those schools – nearly 1,400 positive tests – from their national totals.

The ranks of the injured included some of the most prominent figures in college athletics. In football, coaches Nick Saban from Alabama And the Ryan Day of Ohio Tests tested positive and spent days in isolation. Tom Ezo, Michigan’s men’s basketball coach, has tested positive, as has Jim Boheim of Syracuse and Scott Drew of Baylor. At least three sporting directors at the Southeastern Conference have tested positive.

Universities rarely identify players infected with the virus, as Clemson did when it did It was announced that Trevor Lawrence, the midfielder who could be one of the most wanted players in the NFL draft next year, has tested positive..

Clemson is among schools that have proactively released a regular count of cases within their athletic programs.

“We understand that there is public interest in our administration’s results, and we felt that on the issue of public health, transparency was the best way to work,” said Jeff Kallen, a spokesperson for the Department of Sports, in an email.

Clemson’s opponent in the December 19 ACC Championship game, Notre Dame, has also released regular updates on issues within his ranks.

“We have nothing to hide,” Notre Dame football coach Brian Kelly said in October. “We are fighting through this coronavirus like everyone else.”

He added, “We felt that if we were to hide the numbers, there would be a feeling of distrust, and we did not want to start with that. We wanted to start with transparency and publish the numbers and tell everyone that we will do so.”

Dozens of other schools have not.

By late July, I found the Times At least 630 cases are in the sports departments of 68 campuses. The University of North Carolina has reported 37 infections, for example, and Western Kentucky University said it had only six cases.

But these schools were among the 13 schools that stopped issuing statistics on cases within their sports programs. Some schools changed their curricula as the football season neared, suddenly citing privacy laws to justify withholding the same data that they had provided for weeks or months. A handful of people offered no explanation at all.

Others, like North Carolina, said they ultimately chose to only disclose cases through the charges at the campus level. These numbers cannot be used to assess the extent of the virus exclusively within sports departments.

The university’s director of athletics, Danny White, said this fall that the University of Central Florida had also merged its athletics data with a larger campus, a change it made after players worried that injured students could be easily identified on match day.

“We’re trying to listen to our student-athletes,” White said. Interview with The Orlando Sentinel.

Nineteen universities, including Coastal Carolina, Louisiana State, and Northwestern, have consistently denied or ignored requests for information, and The Times was unable to identify any case data issued by these schools. Many schools that explicitly declined applications provided no explanations for their decisions.

Alvarez was not surprised that some schools had fallen behind. As a former football coach, he said he understood. But he also said that he and others in Wisconsin concluded that normal frequencies should not always apply in 2020.

“I think coaches are sometimes hesitant to give an exploratory report, etc.” Alvarez said. “This is old school. A lot of the coaches are paranoid – and that comes with work – but we felt this was more serious.”

Contribute to reporting Jordan AllenAnd the Barbara HarveyAnd the Daniel IvoryAnd the Alex LemonidesAnd the Alex Leeds Matthews, S. Queen and closes Mitch Smith.