With health officials in B.C. and the NHL unable to agree on contingency plans should a player test positive for COVID-19, Vancouver is out of running as a hub city. (By imacSportsnet)
Popular with players and one of the safest major cities in North America during the global pandemic, Vancouver was seen as a hub favourite to stage half of the 24-team Stanley Cup tournament that the NHL hopes to operate this summer.
“I think we need to recognize that even though most young, healthy people do very well with this virus, some people do get very ill, and we’ve seen that in some of the athletes who have tested positive and who have had an illness in the last few months. It can be a very serious illness for some people who may not even recognize that they have underlying conditions that make them more at risk, or for some of the people in the team who may be older as well.
“Obviously, it’s up to the NHL to make its own decisions and to decide what’s important for the NHL and what isn’t from a commercial and health basis,” he said. “But the evidence is that the focus on public health issues here in British Columbia, led by Dr. Henry, has been exceptional. And I think that’s an argument to come, and I think they probably received that as an argument to come. But presumably, they have many commercial and other reasons that they consider in addition to that.
There were 19 new cases of the virus in B.C. on Wednesday. Only 15 people in the province of 5.1 million people are currently hospitalized due to COVID-19.
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