Population displacements, gatherings, barrier gestures not always respected … The Euro football seems to combine many vectors to promote an epidemic rebound in Europe. Despite the health instructions issued by UEFA to maintain the competition – already postponed for a year – despite the pandemic, the figures are ambiguous.
Last week, cases of Covid-19 contamination increased by 10% in Europe after ten consecutive weeks of decline, alerted the WHO. “There will be a new wave in the European region unless we stay disciplined,” WHO Europe director Hans Kluge told an online press conference last Thursday. The increasingly active circulation of the Delta variant undermines the progress made so far by the various countries to eradicate the epidemic. Russia and the United Kingdom, in particular, both host countries, are hard hit by the strain detected in India. The WHO expects it to constitute 70% of new European cases in early August and 90% in late August.
Instructions not always followed
Masks are compulsory at all times in all stadiums of the competition, and a minimum distance of 1.5 meters must be respected, according to UEFA. But the gauges of spectators as well as the supporting documents are not the same in all the host countries. Thus, as noted Le Figaroall cities require a negative PCR test of less than 72 hours or proof of vaccination at the entrance to the stadium, except those welcoming the most public: Baku, in Azerbaijan, and Saint Petersburg, in Russia.
A steward holds up a sign asking to wear a face mask ahead of the UEFA EURO 2020 Group F soccer match between Germany and Hungary at the Allianz Arena in Munich on June 23, 2021
ALEXANDER HASSENSTEIN / POOL / AFP
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For the semi-finals and the final, the capacity of Wembley Stadium in London will increase to 75%, or around 60,000 supporters. In comparison, the capacity of the Allianz Arena in Munich, which also hosted Euro matches in Germany, was set at 20%, or around 14,000 spectators.
In addition, barrier gestures, such as social distances, are not always respected in stadiums where supporters are sometimes, as we have seen in Hungary, on top of each other.
Hungarian fans cheer ahead of the UEFA EURO 2020 Group F football match between Hungary and France at the Puskas Arena in Budapest on June 19, 2021
FRANCK FIFE / POOL / AFP
Hundreds of supporters infected
In Russia, despite the virulence of the new wave where the Delta variant represents 97% of contaminations, the authorities have maintained the holding in Saint Petersburg, last Friday, of the quarter-final of the Euro football between Spain and France. Switzerland in front of thousands of supporters, especially foreigners. Again, this is a gathering that can participate in the spread of the variant, 40 to 60% more transmissible than Alpha, detected first in the United Kingdom.
Switzerland fans cheer during the UEFA EURO 2020 quarter-final football match between Switzerland and Spain at Saint Petersburg Stadium on July 2, 2021
Dmitri Lovetsky / POOL / AFP
In addition, nearly 300 Finnish supporters, who came to support their team during the group stages, returned from the former Russian capital positive for the new coronavirus, according to Helsinki. This week, the Scottish Health Agency also revealed that almost 2,000 Scots who had traveled to London for the Scotland-England match were carrying the virus… Around 400 of them attended the match from the stadium in Wembley while others followed him from the fanzone or surrounding bars, reports Le Figaro.
Asked about the risk that the Euro football has played or plays the role of “supercontaminant”, the director of the European branch of the WHO replied: “I hope not, but I cannot exclude it” . But “increased mixing, travel, gatherings and the easing of social restrictions” may indeed encourage an epidemic rebound.
Follow the fans better
For Antoine Flahault, director of the Institute of Global Health at the University of Geneva, there is no doubt: “If we wanted to seed Europe with this Delta variant, we would not do it any other way. It is total nonsense to send supporters to very high-risk places, when it would not have been very complicated to envisage moving these matches which take place in cities of countries at risk to cities in lower-risk countries,” he lambasted AFP.
The WHO then calls for closer monitoring of spectators, and not just at the stadium. “We need to look well beyond the stadiums themselves,” said Catherine Smallwood, another official of the UN health organization, when asked about the recommendations in the face of the increase in cases. “What we have to look at around the stadiums is how people get there, are they moving in crowded bus convoys or are they applying individual measures?” – she underlined by warning: “What we observe is that (a new wave) could arrive before the fall”, she warned.
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In an interview with the regional daily Augsburg General published last Tuesday, the German Minister of the Interior for his part urged the British government and UEFA to reduce the number of supporters admitted to Wembley Stadium for the last matches of the Euro. “I find it irresponsible for tens of thousands of people to congregate in narrow spaces in countries classified as at risk because of the highly contagious Delta variant”, as is currently the case in Great Britain.
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