Karpaty Lviv, one of Ukraine’s best known soccer clubs, has suspended all training sessions and activities for at least two weeks, after tests confirmed dozens of COVID-19 cases among the players and club staff.
“According to the results of repeated polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests of players, service personnel and club employees, we have to acknowledge a COVID-19 outbreak,” the club reported late on June 2.
A total of 65 club members were tested, and nearly half of the results were positive, the team’s press service stated.
“All the infected individuals have been notified and are being kept in isolation under medical supervision,” the club said. It called upon Ukraine’s national league to continue with soccer matches in the current season.
“We also urge Ukrainian clubs to be responsible about their players, coaches and personnel. No one is safe from infection,” it continued. “We hope that after the quarantine ends, healthy players, with the involvement of all members of the Karpaty family of all ages, will be able to resume the training process and play the championship to its end.”
Long road ahead
Based in Lviv, a city of 724,000 people located over 500 kilometers to the west of Kyiv, Karpaty currently occupies the 12th line in Ukrainian soccer’s championship chart, with 23 games played and 14 points scored.
The soccer club initially reported its first COVID-19 cases on May 30, but did not disclose the number of people infected with the disease. In response, Karpaty canceled its upcoming game with the Mariupol soccer club, which was due to take place in Lviv on May 31.
Maksym Betsko, medical department secretary of the Ukrainian Association of Football, believes the club will stay out of the championship for much longer than two weeks.
“An infected person can infect a large number of people around him,” the official said on June 3. “This is the specialty of the virus, unfortunately… Only the athletes who are considered healthy by Ministry of Health standards, are completely free of the disease and have even undergone rehabilitation, сan be admitted for sporting events.”
Local significance
The outbreak at Karpaty comes amid a spike in new COVID-19 cases in Lviv Oblast. According to the Ministry of Health’s statement from June 3, the oblast reported a total of 96 confirmed new cases in the past 24 hours, a record high.
“Laboratories have conducted 500 PCR tests in the past 24 hours,” Lviv Mayor Andriy Sadovyi noted on Twitter, attributing the spike in cases to “more tests, more patients.”
“And in all, friends, have a look at the city streets,” he wrote. “There is no quarantine anymore. If people fail to follow the rules, it is predictable that the number of infected people will increase. Our main task today is to prevent the healthcare system of Lviv from collapse.”
In comments to the press later in the day, Sadovyi said that the city could ask the Cabinet of Ministers to reimpose a strict quarantine were the case load to continue to rise.
CORONAVIRUS IN UKRAINE: WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW
- As of 9 a.m. on June 3: 735 people have died from the disease in Ukraine and 10,440 have recovered.
- 24,823 cases of COVID-19 have been confirmed in Ukraine as of June 2. The first case was identified on March 3.
- Ukraine entered the third stage of lifting quarantine on June 1.
- Indoor restaurants are set to open on June 10, if not sooner.
- How the Ukrainian government has been responding: TIMELINE
- Kyiv, Kharkiv and Dnipro subways reopened on May 25.
- Why the Kyiv Post isn’t making its coverage free in the times of COVID-19.
- With international travel on hold, Ukrainians prepare to travel across Ukraine
- TripsGuard website tracks coronavirus travel restrictions in 84 nations.
- Where to buy masks.
