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New Bedford Public Schools will be pausing all athletic practices and competitions through this Friday, January 7, due to an increase in positive COVID-19 cases among several different athletic teams, Superintendent Thomas Anderson announced today. “In consultation with the New Bedford Department of Health, we have been advised to pause participation in our athletic programming including practices and games for one week, beginning today, and continue with test and stay over the next four days,” he said in a memo to School Committee members today.
“As the number of positive cases continue to rise in our community, we are also experiencing an increased number of positive cases on our athletic teams. We now have several teams proactively participating in the Test and Stay Program due to an increasing number of positive cases over the past weekend,” he said.
Thomas Tarpey, NBPS Director of Physical Education, Health & Athletics stated, “out of an abundance of caution, we have put a pause on all Athletics at New Bedford Public Schools for the remainder of this week. We will re-evaluate this weekend and hope to be up and running again on Monday.”
Jodi Spencer, NBPS Manager of Health Services, noted, “The safety of all our students and staff is our foremost priority and this pause in activities will help to limit spreading infections. As the situation is highly fluid, we will be assessing positivity rates on an hourly basis, which will inform our determination regarding extending this pause in Athletics and for any other district events or activities going forward.”
