England is questioning the confidence in South Africa’s biosecure environment, reveals Shuaib Manjra
CSA's chief medical officer Shuaib Manjra has admitted that England have now raised doubts regarding South Africa’s bio-secure environment following the cancellation of the first ODI. The match was called off two hours before it was due to start and now has been rescheduled to Sunday.
The number of Coronavirus cases in the South African camp increased by one on the match day, which resulted in an unfortunate postponement of the first ODI in Cape Town. As a matter of fact, the match was supposed to have been played at Newlands on Friday but now that will not go ahead.
Considering the case was discovered within the bio-bubble after the round of testing came out negative the previous time, there were doubts regarding the bio-bubble and if it was safe at all. England rightfully raised their doubts, which created severe aspersions regarding the tour going ahead, and CSA's chief medical officer Shuaib Manjra admitted the same.
"This test surprised us because we have confidence in the integrity of the bio-secure environment. Further tests indicate that this is a more recent infection that occurred within the bio-safe environment. Clearly there seems to be some kind of breach, which we've investigated in great detail to try and determine where this happened,” Shuaib Manjra said in a video released by CSA on Friday.
“We've traversed a couple of different spaces and tried to recount some events; speaking to the player, looking at security cameras, looking at other information. We haven't been able, to date, to identify where that source was. But clearly it is cause for concern.
"I'm fairly convinced that 99% of the time this environment is working. There may be a breach that's unbeknown to us and may have caused this positive test. So I'm not saying there's a zero risk. There may be a slight risk which we cannot mitigate. There's a lot of moving parts in a tour such as this, and we're trying to control that.
"Clearly, there's a cause for concern and England has expressed a concern. England is questioning the confidence that they have in the bio-secure environment, and rightfully so. If there's been a player who tested positive in the last week, who contracted the virus in the last week, they have cause for concern and we respect that concern."
Given the fact that England are staying in the same hotel as South Africa, they have reasons to doubt the confidence in the bio-bubble. ECB meanwhile released a statement saying that their number one priority is the health and safety of the England team and management group and thus they were fully supportive of the first ODI being called off.
"Our number one priority is the health and safety of the England team and management group, and the correct decision was made following discussions between the two boards and respective medical teams."