When the Philadelphia Phillies met the Miami Marlins on the field last July, a batch of Marlins players were infected with coronavirus, although they didn't know it.

1. Social distancing limited Covid-19 spread for Major League Baseball
teams
 Updated 2145 GMT (0545 HKT) October 22, 2020
By Virginia Langmaid, Jen Christensen and Lauren Mascarenhas,
CNN
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(CNN) — When the Philadelphia Phillies met the Miami Marlins on the field last July, a batch of Marlins players were infected
with coronavirus, although they didn't know it.
One case led to 19 other cases -- a superspreader event, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Thursday.
But with no fans in the stands and strict measures requiring the use of masks, social distancing and other measures, the two
Major League Baseball teams managed to spend 11 hours on the field together over the course of five games without
spreading the virus there, the CDC researchers said.
Social distancing and mask use worked, they said, and team members were safer outdoors than inside.
On July 24, at the delayed start of the 2020 baseball season, the
Philadelphia Department of Public Health was notified that someone from
the Marlins team had a positive test for Covid-19. "The player was isolated
as recommended," the researchers wrote in the CDC's weekly report, the
MMWR.
During the series and the week after, 19 additional team members on the
Marlins tested positive for Covid-19. A sta member on the Phillies also
tested positive. Even though the teams played each other, no opposing
team players, coaches or umpires became infected. The CDC said
interactions outside of on-field play were likely the source of the spread of
the disease.
To try to limit outbreaks this year, MLB took precautions, including holding
games without fans, and banning high-fives, fist bumps and spitting
among players. The enhanced team health and safety protocols reduced
the time opposite team members would interact with each other and their
interaction was mostly outdoors.
"Though one outbreak might not be representative of all scenarios faced
by MLB, by mid October 2020, only 91 of 169,143 samples (0.05%) from
21 di erent teams returned positive test results," the research team wrote.
"No other Covid-19 outbreaks have spread to opposing MLB team
members."
Social distancing, playing games outside, mask measures, and other MLB
health and safety protocols seemed to work, although the measures were
"not infallible" and containing the disease with isolation and quarantine is
important to limit the spread, the researchers concluded.
The only Phillies team member who got sick had closely interacted
indoors with the Marlins, as did the additional Phillies employee who
subsequently tested positive.
The researchers noted that players and sta reported coronavirus
symptoms an average of 2.3 days after positive test results, highlighting
the importance of testing even those who show no symptoms of the virus.
MLB has employed a Covid-19 health monitoring and testing plan for its
players and sta .
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"Our approach evolved as we learned more about the virus," an MLB
spokesperson told CNN Thursday. "We closed the regular season with 30
straight days without a Major League testing positive, and we have
opened the Postseason with 22 days and counting of the same." The
spokesperson noted that no Major League players tested positive for 52
consecutive days through October 21.
Dr. Ali Khan, former director of CDC's O ce of Public Health Preparedness
and Response and now dean of the University of Nebraska's School of
Public Health, is helping advise MLB on Covid-19 risk management and
helped write the report on the outbreak.
"You can't test your way out of this problem," Khan told CNN Thursday,
noting that the MLB and its players were disciplined in practicing
mitigation measures both on and o the field.
Still, he noted that players are often only as safe as the communities they
are playing in.
"Even these multilayers of protection, unless you drop the disease within
the community, you continue to put these individuals at risk in other sports
and in other entities," Khan said. "You have to really drop transmission
within the community to really make sure you're protecting those
individuals."
It might not be possible for all teams to take the measures MLB used,
especially frequent testing and contact tracing, the researchers noted. But non-professional sports can follow other rules to
reduce the risk of spread.
"Willingness to adapt play based on knowledge of community transmission, and adherence to community mitigation strategies
might allow sporting activities to resume," the research team concluded.
Wayne Sterling and Eric Levenson contributed to this article.
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