For months, Washington County had low numbers of Covid-19 cases before an outbreak in the fall associated with an ice rink in Montpelier caused the figures to spike.
The numbers started as a trickle in early October and have risen since, with the state Department of Health reporting 124 Covid-19 cases linked to the ice rink.
The outbreak, the health department said early on, was “associated with people who practiced or played” at the rink at Montpelier’s Central Vermont Memorial Civic Center.
Those testing positive included members of adult and youth hockey teams, broomball players, and their close contacts.
Dr. Mark Levine, state health commissioner, had reported that the outbreak wasn’t tied specifically to the rink, but to social activities taking place before and after games.
Since the first reported positive case in early October associated with the outbreak, there have been a total of 572 new infections in Washington, and 2,388 statewide. As a result, the 124 cases associated with the ice sports make up 22% of the countywide infections, and 5% of the statewide infections.
Speculation on who was patient zero — or, as one person has termed it, “skater zero” — has played out in public on social media, along with offline chatter among those connected with the rink.
“Caused by a non-masked person who lied about his travel,” one Facebook poster wrote on a story associated with the outbreak.
Another added, “These cases are directly linked to a person who traveled out of state for hockey and this is how this outbreak started.”
Several people who have connections to the rink trace the outbreak to an adult league player. They say that man traveled out of state to pick up his son and some of his friends, and at least one of the youths was positive for Covid-19.
The father, son and some of his friends then stayed in the same home, they said. The father continued to go to the rink and take part in social events afterward, even knowing he had been exposed to the virus.
VTDigger has tried to contact the person identified by tipsters as “patient zero,” but without success.
Tips have also come in to VTDigger.
“You hear it from one person, it’s one thing; you hear it from a few, there seems to be some truth in it,” said one parent of a youth hockey player who reported that many around the rink have told a similar version of the story.
Another parent of youth hockey player said, “It was an adult going in there and doing stupid stuff. That person could have been patient zero, or one, two, or three.”
People associated with programs at the rink — which have been put on hold since the outbreak — said there have been heated exchanges over behaviors that led to scuttling league games.
Failure to quarantine
Ben Truman, a spokesperson for the Vermont Department of Health, said in an email that while he could not go into any individual’s circumstances or case information, investigations have found the “Ice Sports outbreak” was the result of several behaviors.
Those behaviors, which are outside the state Covid guidelines, also ring true with what others have heard about the outbreak stemming from the Montpelier rink.
Specifically, according to Truman, the investigations showed individuals not quarantining after the following:
•After being identified as a close contact.
•Upon return from a red travel zone.
•Despite having Covid-like symptoms.
The investigations, according to Truman, also found gatherings of unmasked people, doing daily community activities despite Covid tests pending, and symptomatic people denying symptoms during health screenings.
Gov. Phil Scott, asked during a twice-weekly press conference about policing the behavior of people who don’t comply with the state guidelines in cases, talked about looking ahead, not to the past.
“I don’t want to get caught up in trying to look back only to learn from what we experienced, and to try and guide in the future,” the governor said, later adding, “I’m not sure what we do, to go backwards to try and right the wrong that already happened. We can only look forward and do the best we can.”
Earlier, facing questions about enforcement of the provisions in his executive order, Scott said there are “a lot of tools in the toolbox” that he could use and he favors education over issuing sanctions except in “egregious” cases.
In the one case the state has pursued, the Attorney General’s Office went to court to enforce the executive order against a Rutland gym owner who opened up despite a provision that gyms be closed.
“So, the powers are immense,” the governor said. “But again, I’ve chosen to use this wisely and not to impose fines, not to impose any other sanctions, so to speak at this point in time.”
He added that he believed the “vast majority” of people are doing the right thing.
“And so we don’t want to use a broad brush,” Scott said. “We don’t want to use our limited resources, and public safety, to go after people who aren’t doing the right thing, because I’m not sure that it’s going to gain us all that much.”
No police investigation
Montpelier Police Chief Brian Peete and Washington County State’s Attorney Rory Thibault both referred questions about contact tracing related to the rink outbreak to the state Department of Health.
“To my knowledge, there is no active law enforcement investigation into that matter,” Thibault said. “We generally don’t criminalize things for just simple negligence or carelessness.”
Thibault, who is Washington County’s top prosecutor, added, “Where is the case where you draw the line to begin criminal enforcement and in doing that are you setting yourself up for a sort of ad hoc enforcement of the rules?”
He also said that enforcement through the courts is not the only punishment a person could face for not following the guidelines.
“Is there a social stigma that is even more effective in some ways than a criminal justice response?” Thibault asked. “Is there a degree of shame when people know that they have exposed or broken the rules and caused places to shut down?”
At the start of the Covid-19 pandemic in Vermont in March, another sporting event also played the role as a super-spreader.
In that case, 20 people who attended the March 10 University of Vermont men’s basketball game later reported testing positive for the coronavirus, according to a VTDigger survey, with 34 more who responded saying they suffered from flu-like symptoms and couldn’t get a test. Three people at the game succumbed to the virus.
