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Sean Doolittle on the United States’ handling of COVID-19: ‘We haven’t done any of the things that other countries have done to bring sports back’

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Sean Doolittle spoke to reporters after working out at Nationals Park on Sunday. The Nationals’ relief pitcher spoke about how he’s still unsure if he’ll play in the MLB’s coronavirus-shortened 2020 season and will opt-out if at any point he feels unsafe.

Doolittle also responded very thoughtfully to recent reports that some MLB team owners are considering allowing fans back into stadiums later in the season. Doolittle talked about how the coronavirus pandemic is spiraling out of control in the United States’ and the country has essentially given up its fight against COVID-19.

“We haven’t done any of the things that other countries have done to bring sports back,” Doolittle said.

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Here is Doolittle’s full response via the Washington Post’s Jesse Dougherty.

“I do think it like brings to mind kind of where we’re at in our response to this as a country,” Doolittle began. “Like we’re trying to bring baseball back during a pandemic that’s killed 130,000 people. We’re way worse off as a country then we were in March when we shut this thing down.

“And like, look at where other developed countries are in their response to this. We haven’t done any of the things that other countries have done to bring sports back. Sports are like a reward of a functioning society. And we’re just trying to bring it back, even though we’ve taken none of the steps to flatten the curve, whatever you want to say. We did flatten the curve a little bit, but we didn’t sue that time to do anything productive. We just opened back up for Memorial Day. We decided we’re done with it.

“Life if there aren’t sports, it’s going to be because people are not wearing masks, because the response to this has been so politicized. We need help from the general public. If they want to watch baseball, please wear a mask, social distance, keep washing your hands.

“We can’t just have virus fatigue and keep thinking, ‘Well, it’s been four months, we’re over it, this has been enough time, right? We’ve waited long enough shouldn’t sports come back now?’ No, there are things we have to do in order to bring this stuff back. And now you want to bring fans back? Is this safe? I don’t know. I’m not a public health expert, but we should probably defer to them on some of these issues.

“So I don’t know if it’s safe or not. I really don’t know. But that doesn’t seem like something… I don’t know if that feels like a good idea or not. I don’t know.”

Doolittle’s comments come as the United States has tallied over 50,000 new coronavirus cases every day in July and states like Florida, Texas, Arizona, and Nevada have become new hot spots. The CDC’s Dr. Anthony Fauci recently said its possible the country could see over 100k cases per day if we don’t respond quickly.

While most countries in Europe have flattened the curve, the United States has not. Yet, all the major sports are planning to return over the next month.

During his conversation with reporters, Doolittle also added that the Nationals have not received the PPE gear they were supposed to have including N-95 masks and gloves. The players have also been dealing with testing delays.

Doolittle feels so strongly about these issues, not only because he’s one of the leading voices of the MLBA, but because his wife, Eireann Dolan, has a history of respiratory complications and is at high risk if she contracts the virus.

Regardless of all these issues, Doolittle hopes to play this season.

“I think I’m planning on playing,” Doolittle said. “But at any point, if I start to feel unsafe, if it starts to take a toll on my mental health, with all the things we have to think about and this cloud of uncertainty hanging over everything, then I’ll opt-out.”

Headline photo: Cara Bahniuk/RMNB

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