November 9, 2020

Team Contact Sports in Times of the COVID-19 Pandemic- a Scientific Concept for the Austrian Football League

Category: Article Summary

Topic: Public Health Policy and Practice

Keywords (Tags): sports

[Preprint, not peer-reviewed] No COVID-19 infections occurred during the 12-week period following resumption of the Austrian national male association football league with COVID-19 monitoring. A pre-defined monitoring concept, including (1) health diaries of potential COVID-19 symptoms; (2) PCR results, body temperature and oxygen saturation; and (3) geo-tracking data of players’ movement outside the training/competition facilities (using a smartphone app), was evaluated among 146 players from five clubs from May 15, 2020 to the end of the football season on July 5, 2020. There were few implementation barriers reported relating to health parameters. Implementation of the smartphone app was challenging due to technical problems and reluctance to use.

Zee-Neuen et al. (Nov 8, 2020). Team Contact Sports in Times of the COVID-19 Pandemic- a Scientific Concept for the Austrian Football League. Pre-print downloaded Nov 9 from https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.11.06.20226977