American football and COVID-19: reducing on-field exposures to respiratory particles

American football poses unique challenges to protecting the health of athletes both on and off the field. While off-field activities likely pose the greatest risk of COVID-19 transmission among members of the same team, on-field activities may pose transmission risks from one team to another. The findings of this study suggest that, when used in well-ventilated outdoor environments, helmet modifications combining upper and lower visors may help reduce on-field respiratory transmission risks with relatively minimal effects on athletic performance. These findings may offer practical insights to team physicians and athletic trainers as they seek strategies to protect athletes against on-field transmission of COVID-19 in the weeks and months ahead.

Practical application of Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) Guidelines for COVID-19 autopsies: an Italian experience

Introduction: SARS-CoV-2, responsible for severe human infection with high mortality rate, has been classified as HG3 pathogen. Despite the need to perform autopsy to clarify the pathogenesis of COVID, such procedures are at high risk of contagion due to the direct contact with aerosols and body fluids. To ensure the safety of the personnel against contagion, it is mandatory to follow the SOP for the management of autopsy environment and infected body. Several studies have shown that SARS-CoV-2 persists on inanimate surfaces for a long time and is also ubiquitously detected in many human tissues, even after long time after death. Material and Methods: Many international scientific societies have drowned up various guidelines on biosafety and exposure precautions, but none of these is uniquely adopted. So, in the daily practice our greatest difficulty was to identify SOP adherent to the guidelines but applicable to our reality. In our experience, COVID autopsies were performed accordingly to the following SOP: - COVID mortuary refrigerators - BSL3 autopsy facility - Autopsy saw with aspiration system - PPE: surgical scrub, rubber medical shoes, coverall, shoe leggings, FFP3 mask, waterproof gown or apron, eyes protection, two pairs of medical gloves and one of cut-resistant gloves - Sanitization of surgical tools in autoclave - Sanitization of the environments with VHP - Periodic nasopharyngeal swabs from personnel Results and Conclusions: Our work aims to share our experience and to demonstrate that adopting these measures is effective in reducing risk of infection. In fact, the periodic COVID swabs were negative in 100% of cases.