Leading Off
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Recommend No Mass Gatherings for 8 Weeks. The Center for Disease Control issued a statement last night that stated the following:
Large events and mass gatherings can contribute to the spread of COVID-19 in the United States via travelers who attend these events and introduce the virus to new communities. Examples of large events and mass gatherings include conferences, festivals, parades, concerts, sporting events, weddings, and other types of assemblies. These events can be planned not only by organizations and communities but also by individuals.
Therefore, CDC, in accordance with its guidance for large events and mass gatherings, recommends that for the next 8 weeks, organizers (whether groups or individuals) cancel or postpone in-person events that consist of 50 people or more throughout the United States.
The CDC made it clear that this request (not sure what to call it) does not apply to schools or businesses, but still, you’d think that sending kids to school would be problematic in terms of spreading the disease. And I completely understand that schools are what allow people to work, I’m one of those people, so I’m not sure what will happen. Currently, my ISD is on spring break and I don’t know that a decision will be made until the end of the week. For Texas Tech, this would seem to possibly be an indication that spring practices may not continue at the end of the month.
I did find this Washington Post article incredibly insightful when it comes to understanding why flattening the curve could be critical in slowing down the disease. Visually, it was very easy to understand.
I should also add that I’m going to do my best to not have any politics in any part of the news stories that I post. I’ve always been a news aggregator at heart, so this situation should be no different.
Last night, the AP reported, that “Government official: First dose to be delivered Monday in clinical trial for potential COVID-19 vaccine.” That’s the entire story. You can click over if you want, but that’s it. Cray, huh?
A research team at Sunnybrook Research Institute in Canada have isolated the COVID-19 virus:
“Researchers from these world-class institutions came together in a grassroots way to successfully isolate the virus in just a few short weeks,” said Dr. Rob Kozak, clinical microbiologist at Sunnybrook. “It demonstrates the amazing things that can happen when we collaborate.”
Dr. Arinjay Banerjee, NSERC post-doctoral fellow at McMaster University, said he knows the collaboration won’t stop there.
“Now that we have isolated the SARS-CoV-2 virus, we can share this with other researchers and continue this teamwork,” he said. “The more viruses that are made available in this way, the more we can learn, collaborate and share.”
Plans Moving Forward. I worked on content over the weekend, probably more diligently than I’ve ever worked before. I’m definitely working on Texas Tech content, but I’m also working on some other things that I may not get to until next week. I’m definitely posting some basketball content since someone mentioned updating the recruiting and eligibility tables.
New Tackles. Avalanche-Journal’s Don Williams writes about who is leading the way at offensive tackle, Zach Adams and Casey Verhulst:
“Zach Adams, Casey Verhulst both are better than they were a year ago,” Wells said. “They still need a lot of work, but I’m happy with both those two.
“Landon Peterson’s probably the next one that’s really come out of the off-season and changed his body and got confidence and really had a good couple of days the last couple of days of practice.”