Fans banned from attend­ing CHSAA cham­pi­onship foot­ball games in Pueblo Coun­ty due to wide­spread trans­mis­sion of COVID-19.

Par­ents and oth­er spec­ta­tors of CHSAA-spon­sored cham­pi­onship foot­ball games will be banned from attend­ing the games in Pueblo Coun­ty start­ing the week­end of Dec. 4–5 as the coun­ty “con­tin­ues to have wide­spread trans­mis­sion of COVID-19,” accord­ing to the Col­orado Depart­ment of Pub­lic Health and Envi­ron­ment (CDPHE).

Experts at the Col­orado School of Pub­lic Health esti­mate that 1 in 29 peo­ple in Pueblo and sur­round­ing areas are con­ta­gious with the virus, and so atten­dance will only be lim­it­ed sole­ly to foot­ball teams, ath­let­ic staff, cheer­lead­ers, band mem­bers, broad­cast staff, and oth­er essen­tial personnel.

“We appre­ci­ate the ongo­ing part­ner­ship with the Col­orado High School Activ­i­ties Asso­ci­a­tion as we nav­i­gate these tough times,” said Jill Hun­sak­er Ryan, Exec­u­tive Direc­tor, CDPHE. “Ear­ly in the sea­son, our orga­ni­za­tions both agreed that addi­tion­al safe­ty mea­sures like these might need to be tak­en, and now unfor­tu­nate­ly we are there. These deci­sions aren’t made light­ly, but they’re necessary.”

CHSAA com­mis­sion­er Rhon­da Blan­ford-Green said they sup­port­ed the new restrictions.

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