The GAA has reiterated its commitment to following Nphet (National Public Health Emergency Team) guidelines. This was in response to calls for the association's activities to be suspended in the current coronavirus hot-spot counties of Kildare, Laois and Offaly.
Separately on RTÉ’s GAA podcast this week, UCC professor Gerry Killeen rated as “zero” the chances of the GAA inter-county championship taking place safely later this year, as scheduled.
Commenting, Feargal McGill, Croke Park’s director of games administration who sits on both the GAA’s Covid Advisory Group and the Government’s Return to Sport Expert Group, said that they would be guided by the relevant authorities.
Nphet is meeting on Friday afternoon to consider the surge in positive cases in the three above counties, which has been responsible for nearly half of the national total in the last two weeks.
From day one, we've always said that we'd be guided by Nphet and that hasn't changed
“The position for us is that we’re not public health experts,” said McGill, “and we’ll be guided by those who are. If the authorities turn around and tell us that they have concerns about Gaelic games as a vehicle for transmission of the virus and that we have been doing something to facilitate that, we’ll react.
“For the moment we proceed as normal. If the three counties in question at the moment are to lock down, well then that will be the end of GAA activity there and we’ll deal with that but until that point in time, we’re not intervening.
“From day one, we’ve always said that we’d be guided by Nphet and that hasn’t changed. Someone has to make decisions in the public health context and it can’t be us.”
He said that the GAA wasn’t unduly concerned about the possibility that the authorities could reverse association policy by regarding opposing players as ‘close contacts’ for the purposes of transmission.
“If that’s what they decide, that’s what they decide. At the end of the day, we’re all about recreational pursuits and while we take seriously the organisation of the games, we clearly understand there are bigger issues at stake.”
Earlier on Friday, there were different viewpoints advanced from Government by three Fianna Fáil TDs as well as one independent.
Speaking on local radio, Midlands 103, Minister of State for Finance and Laois TD Seán Fleming said: “There are dozens of matches planned in every county involving hundreds of players this weekend and there are some outbreaks in those areas,” he said.
“I’m involved in the GAA myself and I know players who don’t want to go to matches because they’re coming home to live with their parents who are vulnerable. I know officials who don’t want to attend matches because of the same reason and we have to take a proactive step on that.
“It’ll cause a major upset to the GAA fixtures but I think there is the case immediately for the county boards to consider postponing all these events.”
His Fianna Fáil colleague Barry Cowen, TD for Offaly, took a different view on RTE Radio 1’s News at One and was implicitly critical of the calls to suspend GAA matches:
“In the first instance we have to wait for Nphet and the Government to meet and any recommendations to be considered. I don’t speak for the GAA or any other organisation. I am directed in these instances by the public health experts and they will make their deliberations known, which I expect to be accepted in the interests of public health and safety.
“We don’t need to be knocking one another down in relation to what should and what shouldn’t be closed. People are given that responsibility and we accept or reject their recommendations.”
On the same programme, another TD from an affected county, Kildare South Independent Cathal Berry agreed:
“Listening to what Barry Cowen said there, I’d be very much of his view that we should be guided by the public health experts and I’d be very happy to wait for their considered view in that regard.”
James Lawless, Fianna Fáil TD for Kildare North, however took the opposite view:
“Unfortunately, it does make sense for that kind of voluntary withdrawal from group behaviours, which include if you are playing a game of GAA or soccer or anything that involves people getting down and dirty on a playing field, in close proximity.
“I think people are going to have to put their hands up and say, ‘do you know what, we are going to voluntarily withdraw from those activities and suspend games and fixtures for the next number of weeks’.”
Speaking in this week's RTE GAA podcast, Professor Killeen (holder of the AXA Research Chair in Applied Pathogen Ecology) was asked what the chances were of the GAA's inter-county championships taking place, as scheduled from the end of October, and replied: "Safely, I would say zero."
He added: “For the GAA, it’s an insoluble puzzle. How do you play a game of hurling socially distanced? It’s not possible. It’s not football, hurling or camogie, it’s all the things that we want to reopen, and there’s the tender trap.
Prof Killeen is one of a number of academics who believe in prioritising tighter preventative measures with a view to eliminating coronavirus rather than striking a balance with some level of social activity.
The latter view was espoused by the GAA's Covid Advisory Group, which includes his former colleague Professor Mary Horgan, president of the Royal College of Physicians Ireland and previously Dean of UCC Medical School, who at the end of June described the risks of the return to play as "very, very low".
On figures released to date, cases that have occurred amongst the GAA membership have not been linked to games activities.
