Penn State pauses team activities for ‘several programs’ after 48 new positive COVID-19 results
Penn State Intercollegiate Athletics announced Wednesday it has “paused team activities for several programs and initiated standard isolation and precautionary quarantine” after its eighth round of COVID-19 test results revealed 48 new positives out of 920 tests conducted from Aug. 31 to Sept. 4.
The department disclosed neither the teams that had paused activities nor the identities of the individuals to test positive. It did state that it did not believe the transmission of COVID-19 occurred during team activities.
“These results represent a 5.0% positivity rate for Penn State Athletics and have set in motion many of our established protocols,” Penn State Intercollegiate Athletics said in a statement. “... Contact tracing is being performed and there is no evidence to suggest COVID-19 was transmitted during practice or training activities.”
This is by far the largest number of positive test results and the largest testing total for a single round for the department. The Nittany Lions had previously reported just 11 total positives out of 1,273 tests conducted through their first seven rounds of testing. Penn State began testing athletes upon their return to campus June 8.
As part of protocols established in Penn State Intercollegiate Athletics’ return to campus plan, athletes who test positive are put into isolation for 14 days before being retested. Contact tracing procedures have also been implemented, “which includes quarantine and testing for those individuals who might have been determined to be close contacts of positive individuals, even if asymptomatic.”
