Living in the current messy situation called 2020, social distancing and keeping from social gatherings is more than the norm. Many have had to cancel plans for concerts, festivals, flights and many other events due to the outbreak of COVID-19, most of these having to be postponed indefinitely.
Throughout the country, quarantine meant that most indoor places were to be monitored to a low number of people. In California, for example, …..Restaurants, bars, museums, and other attractions are all being monitored to a low amount of people. Those who have postponed large events are left eager to know when these festivities will be resumed.
As COVID has continued to make a global impact and record numbers are still hitting the charts, businesses seem to have forgotten the threat it comes with and have even gone back to almost back to normal.
To those in Florida, this day came a lot sooner than anyone would have ever expected. On Wednesday Oct. 12, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis granted the state permission to open up their stadiums and allow a full capacity crowd, which at the Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens means up to 65,000 people. Despite this decision, the Miami Dolphins will continue to restrict this number to only 13,000 — during the middle of a worldwide pandemic, many think this is still too many.
Considering the high number of people who would be allowed entry, its important to wonder how many of those people would have actually tested negative from the virus, recently in that matter. One sick person could easily spread the virus to more than one person, so the number of unknown cases walking in can be much different from those walking out.
In what way, shape or form is the state going to manage to have that many people six feet apart from one another? It does not seem like a very realistic plan. The plan that the state of Florida seems to have is to simply just pretend as if the COVID-19 cases have significantly dropped, when in reality it is quite the opposite.
According to USAFacts.org, as of Saturday, Oct. 16, Florida now has seen a total of 748,437 COVID-19 cases and 15,830 deaths. This leaves Florida as the third state with the highest number of cases, following behind California in first and Texas in second.
Head coach for the LSU Tigers football team Dan Mullen took the permission to open up stadiums and ran with it. During a conference after suffering a loss of 41-38 to Texas A&M University, he happened to blame the Texas crowd of 24,079 for having impacted their team and Mullen revealed his plans for the nearby future.
He said, “The crowd was certainly a factor in the game. I will certainly say that, I know our governor passed that rule so certainly hopefully the university administration decides to let us pack the Swamp for LSU next week.”
Texan A&M linebacker Buddy Johnson had something to say about crowds being admitted into stadiums.
He said, “I can tell you one thing about our fans, they’re going to show up, no matter what, COVID or not.”
The country has already seen second waves hit due to cities reopening too early and then getting hit with a huge number of new cases all at once. It leaves one to wonder if money and sports is really more important than the well being of one another.
Ana Delgadillo is a staff writer for The Express. Follow her at @aaanakd.
