In addition to the fear currently plaguing the NBA amid a spate of COVID-19 cases, several players who previously tested positive for the coronavirus have tested positive for a second time, sources told ESPN.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) define “reinfection” as a person who contracts an infection, recovers, and then becomes infected again. Studies are underway on how long the immunity can last, but the CDC says they expect some coronavirus re-infections.
The NBA has announced more than 100 positive tests since last summer, but the actual number since March is believed to be significantly higher. Different teams have more than 10 players who tested positive at some point in the past nine months, sources said.
As tests were less available and there were higher rates of false positives early in the pandemic, there is some uncertainty about the number of players who had true positive results in early 2020, especially during the end of the season. competition of three months.
It’s possible that some players who tested positive for the virus but were asymptomatic months ago were false positives. Some players were tested for antibody levels to determine their immunity level. But there is currently no whole competition procedure for periodic testing.
Team and league medics are reviewing each positive test and each exposed player on a case-by-case basis, as the nature of the virus is still uncertain, officials said. For example, players who tested positive in the past 90 days are sometimes treated differently from players who tested positive last summer due to the way the virus can still appear on their system.
The league’s office, National Basketball Players Association, teams and agents have been in talks over the past few days to consider protocol changes to limit the spread caused by the three-game postponement. The league has placed players who previously had the virus (Kevin Durant of Brooklyn and Bam Adebayo of Miami are two examples) in health and safety quarantines for a week after being exposed to an infected person for fear of reinfection or spreading the virus.
According to current CDC guidelines, the duration of immunity after Covid-19 infection is not yet known. Some reinfections are expected based on knowledge of other coronaviruses, but are believed to be rare.
ESPN’s Tim MacMahon contributed to this story.