Occasionally the question comes up - someone has been sick with the flu or stomach bug but feels better - can they come to judo practice? Working at a hospital and having small kids, I am so familiar with this situation that it almost seems trivial to me, but sometimes it is hard for some folks to make that decision about whether or not to participate.
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The basic guidelines that I follow and recommend -
- If your club is part of a school or university then follow their closings - if the parent organization closes due to weather or epidemic, then you do not have classes. If you are not part of a school or university, it is still a pretty good idea to identify the 1-2 closest schools or colleges and abide by their closings for weather and illness.
- Do not allow participation by anyone who has been acutely ill with flu-like symptoms, fever, vomiting, or diarrhea within the past 24 hours.
- Keep Germ-X or something like it, and pass it around to everyone before class (even when there is no known bug going around). If you know a bug is going around, then pass the Germ-x around before, during, and after classes.
- If a bug has been going around, you might want to consider banning certain techniques and practices - like shomenate and newaza.
- Clean your mats frequently - and perhaps even more frequently when you know that there has been a bug going around.
photo courtesy of Svenstorm
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Patrick Parker
www.mokurendojo.com
