California youth sports play on during the pandemic, but what about face masks?
Youth sports have returned to a Sacramento area salvaging something resembling normal during a second pandemic spring with young athletes playing on fields and diamonds across the region. Lost in the push to play, however, was a vexing question for some sports families: If you’re a parent who wants their child to cover up on the field, what to do if the games are playing on without masks?
In a spring sports season of contact tracing and COVID-19 protocols, much of the national spotlight surrounding face coverings for youth athletes had been dominated by parents protesting on-the-field mask requirements.
Parents in Minnesota recently faced a state senate committee to protest Gov. Tim Walz’s mask mandate for youth sports. A group of Michigan parents last week sued that state’s health director challenging Michigan’s new rules for youth sports.
Now reports from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention of troubling new COVID-19 outbreaks linked to youth sports, worrisome clusters in Minnesota and another outbreak following a youth volleyball tournament in Nevada are refocusing the issue of on-field face coverings for young athletes.
“We are learning that many outbreaks in young people are related to youth sports and extracurricular activities,” CDC director Rochelle Walensky said Monday in a White House briefing. Walensky said youth sports should be limited per CDC guidance adding, short of that, new case clusters can be prevented with testing plans.
Here in California, Southern California parents and their youth athletes celebrated a March court settlement with San Diego County, the state’s public health department and Gov. Gavin Newsom, that allowed all youth and high school sports to resume once a county reached certain COVID-19 case thresholds.
High-contact sports such as football and indoor sports are now subject to the same testing required in college athletics as part of the settlement.
The San Diego court settlement revived youth sports across the state where California Department of Public Health guidelines including on-field face coverings are just that — guidelines — not rules that govern play.
Protests on the pitch
Days after the settlement, frustrated parents of a traveling Bay Area youth soccer team raised masking concerns ahead of a March match at Elk Grove’s Jacinto Creek Park after IR Academy of Elk Grove reportedly said its 10-year-olds wouldn’t be wearing face coverings during play.
The Benicia club’s coach declined to comment; IR Academy officials did not respond to requests for an interview.
But officials with youth league NorCal Premier Soccer in an email to one Benicia parent that was obtained by The Sacramento Bee, said the league’s policies mirror California Department of Public Health, or CDPH, guidance for outdoor and indoor youth and recreational adult sports. Officials said the league’s guidance was “communicated to all NorCal clubs, coaches and managers, with the expectation that teams are proactively communicating in advance of games so that all teams are fully aware of the policies of the facility and club they are visiting.”
“This is the CDPH’s language, not NorCal’s, and leaves open the ability for participants to not wear masks based on what they can tolerate during heavy exertion,” Andy Farrant, NorCal’s director of operations, wrote in the email.
The Benicia team planned to wear masks on the pitch in accordance with the guidelines. Some parents said the Elk Grove side was defying the advisory and its own youth league’s rules with its mask stance.
In the Sacramento-based NorCal Premier youth league, of which IR Academy is a member, that meant “face coverings worn by participants during practice, conditioning and during competition, even during heavy exertion as tolerated,” according to the competition policies that accompanied NorCal’s “Return to Play” restart in early March, and state Department of Public Health guidelines.
Farrant added any public health issues and complaints should be reported to local health officials.
League issues should be reported to NorCal officials by a club’s director of competition or president, Farrant said in the email.
And in an email responding to The Bee’s queries, Farrant said his league’s stance rests on the language in the state’s guidance.
“The state’s language surrounding masks in competitions includes the phrase ‘as tolerated,’” Farrant wrote. “You would need to ask CDPH what their definition of this is, as they wrote this policy which covers all youth sports in California, not just NorCal Premier Soccer.”
State public health officials did not answer a Bee request to clarify the “as tolerated” health guidance.
No mandate on masks
But in California, there is no definitive rule mandating masks on the playing field, as in states such as Minnesota; though players, coaches and spectators on the sidelines and in the stands must wear the face coverings.
The California Interscholastic Federation, the body that governs high school athletics in the state, allows student-athletes to play without masks, for instance. Leagues have wide latitude to set rules.
In Sacramento County, health officials “strongly encourage” face coverings be worn on the field of play, listing its recommendation as “guidance that should be implemented to the greatest extent possible,” while still stopping short of imposing a mask mandate.
That may frustrate parents looking for a firm “yes” or “no” on masks, but it doesn’t have to end there.
What experts recommend
The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that parents help their children make mask wearing a habit by finding a snug, comfortable mask that they can put on and remove by themselves. Have them practice wearing it when running through drills or playing their sport; and have a regular spot where they keep their masks.
The academy says young athletes should wear their face coverings whenever possible and practice physical distancing as much as possible.
And, in a recent interview with Santa Monica public radio station KCRW, Dr. Michael Wilkes, a UC Davis professor of medicine and global health, said parents can do a lot to help their children manage the risk of competing during COVID, including limiting travel to play and compete.
“Parents need to make sure the team, the coaches, other parents are taking prevention seriously,” Wilkes told KCRW in late February. “This means masks and social distancing, and regular testing of all players, coaches and staff. It’s important to monitor disease in the community. The lower the rate of disease in the community, the lower the risk of catching it playing a sport.”
This story was originally published April 8, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
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