Should You Avoid the Gym During the Coronavirus Outbreak?

As coronavirus cases—and related anxiety—accumulate in the U.S., many people are looking at exercise with new eyes. Typically a pillar of health and wellness, the gym in the age of coronavirus seems to many like a petri dish of contagion. But do gym-goers actually need to worry about their daily workout? The short answer is no, says Dr. Paul Sax, medical director of the division of infectious diseases at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. “The gym is not a place that’s necessarily riskier than other communal areas,” Sax says. “I wouldn’t say there’s anything particular about people sweating that makes them more contagious.” People tend to worry about communal places and objects because they fear coming into contact, directly or indirectly, with someone who can get them sick. Viruses that cause illnesses such as COVID-19 and the seasonal flu are often spread via direct exposure to respiratory droplets expelled in the sneezes or coughs of a sick person, but they can also live on surfaces and inanimate objects for days at a time. It’s logical to think that the more people who touch shared objects—like, say, weights and cardio machines—the higher the risk that someone could leave behind a virus, potentially passing it on to others. But this type of surface contamination has not been of much worry to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention during the COVID-19 outbreak. “Transmiss...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized COVID-19 exercise/fitness Source Type: news