On March 11Jurgen Klopp’s side faced the Spanish club in a
second-leg last 16 tie at Anfield in front of a crowd of 52,000, with 3,000 visiting
supporters in attendance recorded.
The match was the last major football fixture played in
England before the coronavirus lockdown.
According to the Sunday Times, Edge Health, which analyses
data for Britain’s National Health Service, estimated the match was “linked to
41 additional deaths” at nearby hospitals between 25 and 35 days later,
compared with similar hospital trusts that were used as a control.
Imperial College London and Oxford University have estimated
Spain had around 640,000 positive coronavirus cases at the time that the match
went ahead compared to 100,000 in Britain at that stage.
March also saw jump horse racing’s four-day Cheltenham
Festival in southwest England go ahead as scheduled, with officials citing
British government guidance that it was safe to proceed with major sporting
events.
According to the Edge Health research estimates cited by the
Sunday Times, that decision may have been linked to 37 additional deaths.
More than 250,000 people attended Cheltenham, with
organisers insisting they had introduced special hygiene measures for the
event, including extra hand-washing stations for spectators.
But racing in Britain was suspended on March 17 in response
to the pandemic after the British Horseracing Authority was widely criticized
for allowing the festival to go ahead.
Last month one of the mayors for Liverpool called for an
investigation into why the Atletico match was allowed to proceed as scheduled.
“If people have contracted coronavirus as a direct result of
a sporting event that we believe shouldn’t have taken place, well that is
scandalous,” Steve Rotheram, Mayor of Liverpool City Region, told the BBC.
“That needs to be investigated to find out whether some of
those infections are due directly to the Atletico fans. There were coronavirus
hot cities, and Madrid was one of those.”
Atletico won the game 3-2 after extra-time to knock out the
defending champions 4-2 on aggregate and reach the quarter-finals.
Sport resumes in Britain, An initial ban on spectators is
expected, having recorded 36,000 deaths during the pandemic — the worst tally
in Europe and second only to the United States.
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