As governments and communities around the world respond to the COVID-19 pandemic, Google and other tech giants have been tracking the dramatic changes in the mobility of people as they cope with lockdown measures. Reporter Veronica Balderas Iglesias talked to residents in and around Washington, D.C., to find out where people are going these days, and why.
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Month: May 2020
New Comet May Be Visible to Naked Eye in Coming Weeks
A new comet that was discovered in April using data from an orbiting observatory may be visible to the naked eye in the coming weeks. The comet was first spotted by amateur astronomer Michael Mattiazzo, who used data gathered by an instrument onboard the European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA’s Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) satellite. The instrument, known as the Solar Wind Anisotropies, or SWAN, maps the constantly outflowing solar wind in interplanetary space by focusing on a wavelength of ultraviolet light emitted by hydrogen atoms. The new comet was picked up by the instrument because it is releasing huge amounts of water, about 1.3 tons per second. Though its official name is C/2020 F8, the comet has become known as Comet SWAN for the instrument that aided in its discovery. It is making its closest pass by Earth on Wednesday — about 85 million kilometers — and can be seen best by those in the Southern Hemisphere or the southern parts of the Northern Hemisphere. Astronomers say residents of the Northern Hemisphere may be able to get a better view of the comet later this month when it makes its closet pass by the sun. But scientists caution the visibility of comets can be difficult to predict, especially as they get closer to the sun. Astronomer Tony Philips told The New York Times it depends on how the comet reacts to solar heating as it approaches the sun in the next few weeks. Comets start to disintegrate as they approach the sun, and that disintegrating material may or may not form a “tail” that helps make the object more visible.
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VIRUS DIARY: On a River, With Rod and Reel, he Finds Peace
The Catskills village that calls itself “Trout Town USA” is all but a ghost town this spring. Fishing shops in Roscoe, New York, that should be overflowing with anglers are empty, due to the coronavirus outbreak. Guide services are idled, since they are nonessential businesses. Yet the region’s famed rivers remain open, mercifully. Like many who love the outdoors, I’ve been pinned down lately by stay-at-home guidance along with work, house chores and storms that have struck during days off. When I finally see a one-day window of clear weather, I leap through it. ___I have always found spiritual connections in rivers. As a child in Erie, Pennsylvania, I caught chubs and suckers in a polluted creek down the block. Later there were trips with my older brother for Allegheny Mountain brook trout. During Army tours, I caught golden trout in the Sierra snowmelt, and rainbows in brawling Alaskan waters.There’s a tune by “The Band” entitled “The River Hymn,” a gospel reverie:”The voice of the rapids will echoAnd ricochet like an old water wellWho’d ever want to let goOnce you sit beneath its spell”___It’s noon when I park at the trailhead of a hike-in Catskills fishing spot. There’s not another soul. Social distancing will be easy. I head down the path under vaulting blue skies, and tranquility enters. When I arrive at the shore, the river is high, cold and discolored from a storm. Mayflies hatch on the water and drift on the breeze, but no trout rise. I rig up anyway and cast a dry fly, a bit of fur and feathers resembling natural bugs that trout eat. I cast for hours. Nothing. Hope springs, so I tie on fly after oddball fly. Beadhead stone nymphs, partridge-and-orange wets, zonker streamers that mimic baitfish. If I had a Rat-Faced McDougal, I would throw it. Nothing. The fish have lockjaw. ___Out here in the woods, there is at least one reminder of the virus: This river is on a local airport’s approach path. Normally, commuter planes and military transports sometimes break the spell. Now the skies are still, no contrails, only mare’s tails. ___It’s evening, the breeze has died. Mayflies fill the amber air.The river has pitched a shutout. The wise angler says catching trout is icing on the cake – the river is joy enough. Fact is, getting skunked hurts. I break down my rod, kick off my waders. I hear the sound my ears have been tuned for: a trout sipping mayflies. I spot the rings of the rise that blossom in the evening current. The fish rises again. Shivering, I pull clammy waders back on, re-string my rod, knot on a fly. ___I get into casting position, one suspender trailing, cold water slopping over my waders. My achy shoulder balks. The line snags a branch and the fly snaps off. I grumble, tie on another. I get a drift over the rise and this time the trout inhales. My brain catches fire. The rod comes alive, the reel ratchets and the fish dives. It leaps, droplets spray. I gain line and the trout tires. I net it. It’s a wild brown, maybe 15 inches, silver sides flecked with black specks and faint red embers. I snap a photo and release it to become part of the river again. A few more trout rise. I wade to shore and listen as I pack up at dark. All around, day creatures find shelter as night creatures stir. A beaver glides to its lodge. Wood ducks wing to nest. An owl calls, “who-cooks-for-you.” The current whispers. That’s the river hymn.
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Tech Giants Confirm People Moving Around Less During Lockdown
As governments and communities around the world respond to the COVID-19 pandemic, Google and other tech giants have been tracking the dramatic changes in the mobility of people as they cope with lockdown measures. Reporter Veronica Balderas Iglesias talked to residents in and around Washington, D.C., to find out where people are going these days, and why.
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Photographer Captures Families Sheltering at Home
The pandemic has kept many people quarantined at home with family and pets for weeks. A grassroots photography initiative called the Front Steps Project has inspired hundreds of photographers to document people in front of their homes during this extraordinary time. Matt Dibble follows one photographer connecting with neighbors in Oakland, California.
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Telethon Raises $115M for New Yorkers Impacted by COVID-19
Tina Fey shed tears after announcing that more than $115 million was raised toward supporting New Yorkers impacted by COVID-19 during a virtual telethon.
“Thank you, thank you,” said a tearful Fey, the host of the Rise Up New York! event Monday evening. The Emmy-winning actress along with other A-list celebrities from Barbra Streisand, Jennifer Lopez and Michael Strahan asked for donations to help relief and recovery efforts.
“Our city is under attack, but we’ve been here before,” Robert De Niro said. “In the last 20 years, both 9/11 and Hurricane Sandy. You can take your best shot but you cannot break our spirit.”
The one-hour benefit was presented by the New York-based poverty fighting organization, Robin Hood, and iHeartMedia.
Robin Hood said all the donations will provide support for food, shelter, cash assistance, mental health, legal services and education.
“If you had breakfast today, you are better off than 2 million of your neighbors who woke up hungry,” Fey said.
Mariah Carey performed her 1992 song “Make It Happen.” She sang while her backup singers and pianist performed on separate screens to the upbeat tune.
“We can make it through this together,” Carey said.
Lin-Manuel Miranda, Cynthia Erivo, Idina Menzel, Ben Platt and others performed a rendition of Frank Sinatra’s classic song “New York, New York.” Lopez introduced PS22 Chorus, a collection of New York elementary school students who sang Andra Day’s “Rise Up.”
“New York, I know your strength,” said Lopez, a New York native.
Spike Lee shared encouraging words that sports would return someday soon. Streisand and Audra McDonald showed the same optimism about New York City’s Theater District coming back “stronger than ever” after being closed due to the pandemic lockdown.
New York Giants greats including Strahan, Eli Manning, Phil Simms and Justin Tuck announced an opportunity through a sweepstakes for one fan to play a game of touch football with the players in their own backyard and get a Super Bowl ring. The winner of the sweepstakes and three friends will have a chance to play against the players.
Other musical performances included Sting’s “Message in a Bottle” and Bon Jovi’s “It’s My Life.”
Billy Joel closed out the benefit performing “Miami 2017” after being introduced by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo. The performance was simultaneously shown on 13 of Time Square’s digital billboards. A choreographed lighting show debuted at the Empire State Building that will repeat at 9 p.m. EST throughout the week.
For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough that clear up in two to three weeks. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia, and death. The vast majority of people recover.
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Tech Giants Confirm People Move Less During COVID Lockdown
As governments and communities around the world respond to the COVID-19 pandemic, Google and other tech giants have been tracking the dramatic changes in the mobility of people as they cope with lockdown measures. Reporter Veronica Balderas Iglesias talked to residents in and around Washington, D.C., to find out where people are going these days, and why.
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Warmer Than Average Temperatures Expected Over Next Three Months
Climate scientists expect above-normal temperatures over the next three months, despite the absence of an El Nino, a natural phenomenon that tends to boost global temperatures. In past years, record heat has occurred in El Nino years. But that is changing according to the global seasonal climate update from the World Meteorological Organization. The WMO said that April 2020, a non-El Nino period, is tied as the warmest month on record with April 2016, when there was a strong El Nino, as well as climate change. WMO spokeswoman Claire Nullis said all the years subsequent to 2016 have been very warm without El Nino, including 2019, which was the second warmest year on record. She notes the trend has continues into this year. “Global temperatures in January, February and March were also the warmest or second warmest year on record, according to international data bases,” Nullis said. “So, we are seeing now that the human influence on our climate is actually stronger. It is more powerful than natural sources of nature, such as El Nino.” Heat waves increasingThe WMO said most extreme weather events are happening against a backdrop of climate change. It said heat waves are increasing due to climate change, and that is having a major impact on extreme events such as tropical cyclones and heavy rainfall. East Africa, for example, is experiencing record rainfall and flooding. Nullis told VOA that preparing for and managing the impact of extreme weather events is becoming more difficult due to COVID-19. She explains that nations are not paying enough attention to early warning systems because of the pandemic. “We really do need strong multi-hazard early warning systems against hurricanes, against heat waves, because these things are all interlinked,” Nullis said. “They have a cascading effect, and COVID now is one of those hazards.” WMO scientists said the COVID-19 pandemic more than ever before increases the need for reliable weather forecasts and longer-term climate outlooks. They said temperatures and precipitation have a major impact on key economic and public health systems, noting that many have been brought to the brink of collapse by the pandemic.
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Will Warmer Weather Slow COVID-19 Spread?
Since the COVID-19 pandemic first erupted in China this winter, hopes have lingered that the outbreak would die down with the change of seasons. “A lot of people think that goes away in April with the heat,” U.S. Stalls are shuttered at Hong Lim Hawker Centre in Singapore, May 10, 2020, amid the coronavirus outbreak. COVID-19 cases in Singapore recently spiked to 700 to 800 per day.”We can see that this virus has spread all over the world, with many different temperatures,” said Universidad Católica de Valencia bioengineering professor Angel Serrano Aroca. “I believe that there is an effect of weather conditions, but I think that this virus is so contagious that there are other factors that are much more important.” Population density, social-distancing measures and public health tools such as testing and contact tracing likely have more of an impact than weather, experts said. For Murray and colleagues at the University of Washington, “mobility is the most important (factor) and then testing per capita,” he said. When his group more than doubled their estimated COVID-19 death toll in the United States, from 60,000 in mid-April to 135,000 last week, it was largely because states were loosening social distancing and individuals were moving around more even in supposedly locked-down areas. Temperature is probably “important, yet minimal,” he said. Scientists still have a lot to learn about the virus, however. “As some places warm up,” Murray added, “we may get a stronger signal to understand better what the actual full temperature or seasonality effect will be.”
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Homophobia Hampers South Korea’s Virus Campaign
As South Korea grapples with a new spike in coronavirus infections thought to be linked to nightspots in Seoul, including several popular with gay men, it’s also seeing rising homophobia that’s making it difficult for sexual minorities to come forward for diagnostic tests.
The first confirmed patient in the new coronavirus cluster was a 29-year-old man who visited five nightclubs and bars in Seoul’s Itaewon entertainment neighborhood in a single night before testing positive for the virus last Wednesday. Further investigation has since found more than 100 infections that appear linked to the nightspots.
A Christian church-founded newspaper, Kookmin Ilbo, reported last week that the places the man visited in Itaewon on May 2 included a gay club. The report was followed by a flood of anti-gay slurs on social media that included blaming the man and those at the club for endangering the country’s fight against the pandemic.
Views on sexual minorities in South Korea have gradually improved in recent years, but anti-gay sentiments still run deep in the conservative country. Same-sex marriages aren’t legal and there are no prominent openly gay politicians or business executives, though some have risen to stardom in the entertainment world.
Activist groups have criticized the Kookmin Ilbo report, saying that it was irrelevant that some of the nightspots the man went to were popular with gay people and the newspaper should not have disclosed it.
It’s not even known how big role the man played in the new outbreak, with officials saying that local infections in Itaewon may have already begun before he contracted the illness. Authorities have been trying to track down and test thousands of people who may have come in contact with those infected, a process activist say has been made more difficult now that there is a sexual stigma attached to the new outbreak.
Lee Jong-geol, general director of the gay rights advocacy group Chingusai, said dozens of sexual minorities who had recently visited Itaewon clubs called his office and expressed worry about being outed or disadvantaged at work if they are placed under quarantine.
While there have been no reports hate crimes or physical attacks linked to the fresh surge of homophobia, Lee said “anxiety and fear have flared inside of sexual minority communities.”
The new cluster threatens South Korea’s hard-won gains in its virus fight, which were the result of aggressive contact tracing and mass testing. The roughly 30 new cases reported daily the past three days are higher than single-digit increases the country had been reporting recently. Still, it is far lower than the hundreds of cases recorded each day in late February and early March.
Alarmed by the sudden spike, authorities in Seoul and most other South Korean cities ordered the temporary closing of all nightlife establishments, and the education ministry delayed the opening of schools by another week.
According to Seoul’s city government, as of Monday authorities were unable to reach more than 3,000 people who visited Itaewon nightspots in recent days. Heath Ministry official Yoon Taeho said Tuesday that police were trying to track down club and bar patrons who officials haven’t been able to contact.
Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun and several health officials expressed worry that the surge in homophobic sentiment could hurt the virus fight.
“At least under the viewpoint of quarantine, denunciation of a certain community isn’t helpful,” Chung said in televised remarks Sunday. “If contacts avoid diagnostic tests in fear of criticism, our society has to shoulder its entire consequences.”
Kim Jyu-hye, who doesn’t identify as strictly male or female and lives in a rural town, said that people there, when talking about what happened in the Itaewon clubs, often said that “gays like roaming around all night long and sleeping with many men.”
“These days, I feel more isolated and I’m afraid about my relationships with other people because they are shifting their anger about new coronavirus outbreaks onto sexual minorities,” Kim said.
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Warmer Weather May Slow, Not Stop, COVID-19
Since the COVID-19 pandemic first erupted in China this winter, hopes have lingered that the outbreak would die down with the change of seasons. “A lot of people think that goes away in April with the heat,” U.S. Stalls are shuttered at Hong Lim Hawker Centre in Singapore, May 10, 2020, amid the coronavirus outbreak. COVID-19 cases in Singapore recently spiked to 700 to 800 per day.”We can see that this virus has spread all over the world, with many different temperatures,” said Universidad Católica de Valencia bioengineering professor Angel Serrano Aroca. “I believe that there is an effect of weather conditions, but I think that this virus is so contagious that there are other factors that are much more important.” Population density, social-distancing measures and public health tools such as testing and contact tracing likely have more of an impact than weather, experts said. For Murray and colleagues at the University of Washington, “mobility is the most important (factor) and then testing per capita,” he said. When his group more than doubled their estimated COVID-19 death toll in the United States, from 60,000 in mid-April to 135,000 last week, it was largely because states were loosening social distancing and individuals were moving around more even in supposedly locked-down areas. Temperature is probably “important, yet minimal,” he said. Scientists still have a lot to learn about the virus, however. “As some places warm up,” Murray added, “we may get a stronger signal to understand better what the actual full temperature or seasonality effect will be.”
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How Non-Medical Hospital Staff is Coping with Pandemic Threat
It is not only doctors who are exposed to the deadly coronavirus every day – there are all the non-medical employees at hospitals who face the same risks every day. Maia Kay reports on how they are coping with today’s harsh reality.
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Fauci: US Pro Football Will Have to ‘Play It by Ear’
The National Football League has announced its 2020 schedule and is already touting some matchups as “must-see” contests between Super Bowl contenders.But the country’s top infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, is cautioning sports-hungry fans not to be overly eager.”The virus will make the decision for us,” Fauci told NBC-TV sports. “I think it’s feasible that negative testing players could play to an empty stadium.” Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, speaks about the coronavirus in the James Brady Press Briefing Room of the White House, April 17, 2020, in Washington.Fauci said the coronavirus is unpredictable, and there is no guarantee the NFL or any sports league will be able to resume normal play. “Even if the virus goes down dramatically in June, July and August, as the virus starts returning in the fall, it would be in my mind, shame on us if we don’t have in place all of the mechanisms to prevent it from blowing up again,” Fauci said, adding that players and fans will “have to play it by ear” whether there will be a full NFL season this year. “If you really want to be absolutely certain, you’d test all the players before the game. … To be 100% sure, you’ve got to test every day. But that’s not practical, and that’s never going to happen.” All major U.S. sports leagues that play in the spring — basketball, hockey, soccer and baseball — have suspended their games, frustrating fans, players and especially those who work in and around stadiums. The Associated Press reports that Major League Baseball owners have approved a plan for a shortened season that would start the first week in July. The games would be played without fans, but the league hopes that restriction would be gradually lifted depending on cities and counties. The season would be 81 games instead of the usual 162. The annual All-Star Game would be canceled, but the playoffs would be extended. The MLB Players Association would have to approve the plan if it were to take effect.
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Shanghai Disneyland Reopens
Thousands of visitors in face masks Monday streamed into the Shanghai Disney Resort, the first of the Disney theme parks to reopen since the COVID-19 pandemic began. Disney is taking precautions to protect visitors and prevent the spread of the coronavirus. The number of visitors is limited. Face masks are required, and temperatures are checked at the gate. Guests are also required to show government-issued identification and use a smartphone app issued by the Shanghai city government that tracks their health and contacts with anyone who might have been exposed to the virus. Andrew Bolstein, senior vice president of Disney operations in Shanghai, says maintaining social distance has been a high priority in the park. They have added markers to show guests where to stand, as well as where not to — outside restaurants, shops and all attractions, anywhere people will congregate. Visitors line up following social distancing markers at Shanghai Disney Resort as the Shanghai Disneyland theme park reopens following a shutdown due to the COVID-19 outbreak, in Shanghai, China, May 11, 2020.China, where the coronavirus was first detected in December, was the first country to reopen factories and other businesses after declaring the disease under control in March, even as infections rose and controls were tightened in other countries. Tourism was hit especially hard by restrictions imposed around the world that shut down airline and cruise ship travel, theme parks and cinemas. Disney’s latest quarterly profit fell 91%, and the company said virus-related costs cut pretax profit by $1.4 billion. Shanghai Disneyland and Disney’s park in Hong Kong closed in late January, as China isolated millions of people to try to contain the virus outbreak. Tokyo Disneyland closed in February, and parks in the United States and Europe closed in March. Headquartered in Burbank, California, Disney has yet to set a date for reopening its other parks worldwide.
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Virtual Movie Releases, a Financial Lifeline for Smaller Movie Theaters
Movie theaters have shut their doors to the public due to Covid -19. To offset lost revenues, some have teamed with distribution companies and created online platforms where viewers can watch new releases virtually. VOA’s Penelope Poulou spoke with a distributor and a theater manager about the new viewing model
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Here’s Why Virus Mutations Worry Scientists
You can count on viruses to change. VOA explains the process and why it could pose problems for researchers who are working on a COVID-19 vaccine.
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Actor Jerry Stiller Dies at Age 92
Comedy star of stage, film and television Jerry Stiller has died at the age of 92.His son, actor Ben Stiller, said he died early Monday of natural causes.Stiller became famous in the 1960s as he teamed with wife Anne Meara in films, stage productions, commercials, and television programs, including the “Ed Sullivan Show.”He found renewed fame in the 1990s playing the cranky, loud Frank Costanza on the TV show “Seinfeld.” He won his only Emmy award for the role.Stiller’s career also included roles in Broadway shows “The Ritz” and “Hurlyburly,” as well as hit movies “Hairspray” and “Zoolander.”
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China Reports Spike in New COVID-19 Cases
China’s health commission is reporting a spike in new COVID-19 cases in several provinces, prompting health officials to urge citizens to use personal protection. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the coronavirus.At a Beijing news conference, National Health Commission spokesperson Mi Feng said 17 new cases were reported Monday, up from 14 the day before. This marked the first double-digit increase in new cases in 10 days.The spokesman said seven of the new cases were listed as “imported” into the inner-Mongolia region from overseas, while five were in the city of Wuhan, the epicenter of the pandemic, where a strict lockdown was lifted last month.Another five cases were spread across three northeastern provinces, including Jilin, where authorities suspended train service in and out of a county after a cluster was recently detected. China state television reports a team of experts was being sent to the area to investigate the situation.According to the Johns Hopkins University’s coronavirus dashboard, China currently has more than 84,000 confirmed infections, and 4,637 deaths.
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Read, the Beloved Country: Literature in Locked-Down South Africa
This is a story about books in an unlikely place, and their struggle to get into the hands of people during a national lockdown. South Africa’s eased lockdown means books are finally available for sale again, but in the nation’s biggest city, with its reputation for speed and hustle, do people care? VOA’s Anita Powell takes us on a literary journey through the unlikeliest of literary towns: Johannesburg.
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Virtual Political Conventions Becoming a Realistic Alternative
If the coronavirus pandemic forces large-scale events to be either discouraged or cancelled this summer, American political conventions may be among the country’s cultural casualties. Instead of the four-day festival that fills sports arenas, a virtual convention would connect thousands of delegates from all 50 states, plus U.S. territories, to cast votes on everything from political party rules to selecting who will run for president – all on a Zoom-like platform. Currently, the two parties are scheduled to hold back-to-back conventions in mid- to late August, with the Democrats convening in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, followed by the Republicans gathering in Charlotte, North Carolina. Presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden has hinted that his party may opt for a virtual convention if the pandemic continues to rage on, while President Donald Trump has been emphatic in saying his party would gather to nominate him for a second term.FILE PHOTO: Democratic U.S. presidential candidate and former Vice President Joe Biden speaks about responses to the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic at an event in Wilmington, Delaware, U.S., March 12, 2020.But there’s no way of knowing at this point how the conventions will play out, and politicians and political analysts are intensely speculating on what a virtual convention might look like. “There’s two aspects to this. There’s the legal and the political,” says President Donald Trump walks onstage to speak at a campaign rally, Feb. 28, 2020, in North Charleston, S.C.Virtual or conventional convention? Former Vice President Joe Biden suggested the idea of a virtual convention in early April, days after Democrats moved the dates of their convention in Milwaukee from July 13-16 to August 17-20. That is one week prior to the Republican convention in Charlotte, August 24-27. Trump has mocked Biden’s virtual convention suggestion. Both Republican and Democratic party chairpersons recently said plans for live, in-person conventions are proceeding. If circumstances force a change, Brown is interested to see which party produces a better virtual experience. “We have watched parties do national conventions for years. They know what are the best ways to gain attention and excite their partisans. But this would be a whole new world. And what that means in terms of the creativity and the ingenuity is really an unknown. And there might be a differential advantage for one party or another as they proceed down this path.” Kamarck notes the final decision on how to hold the convention is not necessarily in the parties’ control. “If, in fact, we are still in this kind of very difficult situation, there’s going to be people in Milwaukee who don’t want to work at the convention. There will be people at Charlotte who don’t want to work at the convention. There will be people in both cities who do not look forward to having 20 to 30 thousand people from all over the country,” Kamarck observed.
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Virtual Political Conventions Becoming a Realistic Alternative
Events and event planning are among the societal casualties of the coronavirus pandemic. In 2020, in the United States, the biggest among them could be national political nominating conventions. VOA’s Steve Redisch examines what a virtual political convention might look like and how it may change the way American politics is conducted.
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Bundesliga Could Provide Blueprint for NFL
The National Football League has time on its side as the sports world prepares to emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic and will use some it to observe German soccer’s Bundesliga as a potential blueprint on how to deal with the outbreak.The NFL, which is due to kick off on Sept. 10 and has not yet seen its schedule affected by the novel coronavirus, is paying close attention to protocols other leagues, particularly the Bundesliga, are putting in place in a bid to restart play, according to a report in Newsday.The top-flight Bundesliga season will restart on May 16, making it the first European league to resume amid the pandemic that has infected more than 3.95 million people globally and killed more than 270,000.”We’ve been in contact with all domestic leagues, but also sports organizations around the world,” Brian McCarthy, the NFL’s vice president of communications, told Newsday.“We have a number of protocols, see what works, see what can translate into our sport.”We’re all in the sports business, but every sport has its own matters to attend to.”Germany’s top flight will resume under strict health protocols, with no fans allowed in stadiums.All teams have had to go into a seven-day training camp in complete isolation with players tested before their inclusion in the camps to reduce the risk of any infection.About 300 people, including players, staff and officials, will be in and around the stadiums during matchdays.The NFL unveiled its 2020 schedule on Thursday with the expectation of playing games with fans in the stadiums but is approaching the season with some caution.League commissioner Roger Goodell has informed teams they will be required to have a ticket refund policy in place for canceled or disrupted games.McCarthy told Newsday: “We’re looking at what we can adopt, what we can modify that is working in other sports, sharing best practices.”
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