Return to sport should be about safety, not prizes
This is the third in a series exploring the long-term social impacts of COVID-19, written by members of the Trudeau Foundation COVID-19 Impact Committee:
Many Canadians are keen to see the reopening of high performance and professional sport. Athletes, coaches and support staff want to return to training and then competition. People whose livelihood depends on high performance and professional sport being active want to get back to work. Spectators want to once again enjoy cheering on their favourite athletes and teams.
But how should this reopening happen in the face of an ongoing pandemic? To answer this question, we must first get clear on the values that should guide decision-making.
First and foremost, any plans to return to high performance and professional sport must be consistent with public health and include an explicit commitment to follow the lead of public health authorities.
Any return must protect the health of athletes, coaches and support staff. Participants must be assured that all reasonable risk-reduction measures will be taken by sport organizations.
Return must be developed through the lens of safe sport. We have only recently begun to confront the true depth and breadth of abuse and harassment in sport, in particular sexual abuse and harassment. Where safety cannot be protected (e.g., if rules about minors always being accompanied by at least two adults cannot be followed due to physical distancing requirements), return to sport should not be allowed. Return must also be developed through the lens of clean sport. Canada has international commitments to ensure drug-free sport. Drug testing had to be paused because it could not be conducted under the public health restrictions. Return should be restarted only insofar as it complies with the Canadian Anti-Doping Program.
Attention must also be paid to Canada’s constitutional value of equality and commitment to non-discrimination. Some athletes, coaches and support staff are more vulnerable to COVID-19 infection or serious adverse consequences if infected. How can their physical condition be accommodated?
For example, should they be given access to facilities with no or fewer other athletes present even if that reduces the total number of training hours available for all athletes? Should a later return to training and competition be taken into account in team selections?
Finally, the value of solidarity must be a part of any return plan. The COVID-19 pandemic has called on all Canadians to pay a price in order to try to protect each other and our health care system. This has certainly been felt by many in relation to the loss of access to gyms and other sports facilities. Ongoing cleaning and physical distancing requirements will force us to ration access.
We will need to revisit some of our past assumptions about privileged access to sports facilities. For example, should high performance and professional athletes be given priority access over those who need the facilities for physical rehabilitation? Should university varsity athletes be given exclusive access to the gyms typically reserved only for their use over other students whose mental and physical health could be enhanced by access to those gyms?
Under conditions of shortages of testing kits, components, and services, should high performance athletes be given priority access to COVID-19 testing? It is true that historically there has been an uneven distribution of access to facilities, goods and services for high performance and professional athletes in Canada.
But now, in the time of increased scarcity, how should we understand the concept of the common good? How does it relate to the pursuit of medals and world championships?
Like so many, I want to see the return of high performance and professional sport. I would love to see the Canadian women’s soccer team take the field, to see Bianca take the court, and to hear “We the North” ring out again. But the plan to get there should be developed with our eyes not on the prize, but on ensuring the return is safe, clean, equitable and infused with a commitment to solidarity and the common good.