First frisbee game is: 6pm Tuesday 30th March at Florence Park...
James Schumann
Neal Graneau
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7 Coniston Av, Oxford, OX3 0AN, UK
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Tom Dale
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I think it would be useful to discuss how we’re going to play over the next few months. There are two aspects to this: 1. the legal position and 2. what we as individuals are comfortable with. It would be useful to know how different people interpret this and what people are comfortable with, so please do reply to this with your thoughts.
1.
The legal position is that sport can recommence if it is ‘organised’ and if it follows the guidance of the sport’s national governing body. To quote from the government guidelines, “this means sport which is formally organised by a qualified instructor, club, national governing body, company or charity and follows sport-specific guidance”.
In order to stay within the law, we therefore need to demonstrate that our group is formally organised as a club and that we follow sport-specific guidance. It seems to me to be ambiguous whether we are a ‘club’ that ‘formally organises’ our sessions. On the one hand, we take out an annual insurance policy and have a fairly stable membership. On the other, we don’t have official membership or any officers. I’m sure there are more factors at play here that I’m missing, so please do pitch in on this.
Neal has attached the UK Ultimate ‘Phased Return to Play’ sheet. You can find more information at https://www.ukultimate.com/story/phased_return_play_guidance, particularly in the links at the bottom. To summarise, to stay within the rules and play with more than six people, we must:
- Appoint a Covid-19 Officer
- Write a Covid-19 plan
- Fill out a risk assessment (UKU has a template we can copy)
- Ensure that all participants understand and agree to the Covid rules (see Neal's attached sheet)
If we do this then my interpretation is that playing with more than six people would be legal. If we don’t do this, then it probably won’t be. Minh has already laid the groundwork for us being an official club by organising the insurance – many thanks Minh, we’re all very grateful. I’m happy to work on the rest, and I would appreciate some help with it so please let me know if you’d like to work on this with me.
2.
Different individuals in our group are comfortable with different levels of risk. Ideally, we will cater to all preferences.
There are two main areas of risk: risk from the virus and risk of having to self-isolate. If you are more risk-averse, playing in a smaller, fixed group will likely appeal to you. If you are less risk-averse, you will likely be comfortable playing more as we usually do.
Risk from the virus can be mitigated by following the UKU guidance, e.g. no marking from closer than a metre and no stall counts. Please read the full guidance at https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_CWOc4f14VVir3ooKoMwiVsuDSWTus4fjNNBQDQnNx4/edit.
Over the winter, the smaller group tended to abide by this guidance more than the larger group. I think it’s just easier to remember and enforce when there are fewer people involved and when those people don’t change every session.
I suspect that the risk of having to isolate is for most of us more worrying. If we play in a big group, we are more likely to play with someone who goes on to test positive. I can’t find anything in the UKU guidance that explicitly says that you must isolate if someone you’ve played with tests positive. The rule for football, which is more of a contact sport than frisbee, is:
“What happens if a player tests positive for Covid-19?
If there is a player who has tested positive, they must from that point self-isolate (or if they have symptoms, from the moment of symptoms) and NHS Test and Trace will pick up from this point. The player should contact NHS 111. The Club can carry on, but be mindful to ensure all the guidelines are strictly followed on social distancing, hand washing etc. If Test and Trace contact them, they must provide the details and then if deemed anyone needs to isolate on their instruction, do so.
What happens if I have played an opposition team and one of their players has tested positive for Covid-19?
Match play is not considered ‘close contact’ so no action is needed unless individuals experience symptoms, in which case they must self-isolate from that point as per Government guidance.”
I assume, then, that a positive test from someone you’ve played with doesn’t automatically mean you have to self-isolate. The risk of outdoor transmission is low, and assuming that we follow the risk mitigation guidance then I think we’ll be fine. This isn't something we can just assume and forget, though. We need to proactively enforce the rules and remind ourselves and each other of them.
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So the questions are:
- Would you like to play as we normally do, i.e. in a large group with no fixed memberships, or would you rather play in a smaller group with fixed members?
- Are you happy to commit to following the UKU guidance linked to above?
I appreciate that this bureaucracy and these rules are frustrating. We would all rather just return to normality and not have to consider such things. But this is what we need to do for now to get back to playing, so let’s do it.
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margueri...@phonecoop.coop
To view this discussion on the web, visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/oxfordultimatefrisbee/CAAPbY1svOuoo_DZmBoQhsXMM6Y8JQNmS-tXmrpeLdSg_O9FNhA%40mail.gmail.com.