By Mike Kruzman / news@whmi.com


A local legislator is urging the governor and the state health department to let all high school athletes participate in their winter sports.

The fight over whether to allow youth contact sports to resume took center court, Thursday, in Lansing, as Michigan lawmakers heard testimony from educators, parents and students wanting to get back to competition. The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services has continued to push back the start date for winter high school contact sports. That date currently stands at February 21st.

Republican State Senator Lana Theis of Brighton Township chairs the Senate Education and Career Readiness Committee, which on Thursday adopted Senate Resolution 7, urging Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer and the state health department to end the suspension on sports and allow play to resume immediately. The resolution cites the executive director of the Michigan High School Athletics Association who indicated 99.8% of the 30,000 rapid COVID tests on fall athletes were negative, and data that shows heightened stress, anxiety and mental health issues in high school and college students.

Theis said in a release that virtually every aspect of athletics benefits those who participate from physical exercise, to social interaction, and the development of leadership skills. She said that teamwork and healthy competition taught by sports are components of a well-rounded education and that high school athletes, while almost all are abiding by the rules, have not been allowed to play. Theis said the science does not back up Whitmer’s actions and that is resulting in the theft of thousands of student-athletes’ opportunity to compete.

However, that point of view is not shared by state health officials. Lynn Sutfin, spokeswoman for the state health department, said sports that require closeness between players make it more difficult to prevent disease transmission even with masks and other mitigation measures in place. “These risks are even greater for indoor contact sports where there is not natural ventilation to mitigate the close proximity of participants,” she said, adding that teams may be able to decrease risk with robust public health measures “but risk remains elevated.” It was also noted that the concern is even greater with recent confirmation of the more-transmissible COVID-19 variant in Michigan.