While President Trump and his republican supporters continue claiming that coronavirus doesn’t have any significant impact on the young and the healthy, Penn State’s director of athletic medicine announced that about one-third of the Big Ten athletes who tested positive for COVID-19 also developed myocarditis.
As reported by the Centre Daily Times, the regional media outlet covering State College, Pennsylvania, Dr. Wayne Sebastianelli told the State College Area School Board that 30-35% of athletes who tested positive, whether showing symptoms or not, were found to have myocarditis when given a cardiac MRI.
“When we looked at our COVID-positive athletes, whether they were symptomatic or not, 30 to roughly 35 percent of their heart muscles (are) inflamed,” Sebastianelli said. “And we really just don’t know what to do with it right now. It’s still very early in the infection. Some of that has led to the Pac-12 and the Big Ten’s decision to sort of put a hiatus on [fall sports seasons].”
Myocarditis is an inflammation of the heart muscle that can cause the heart to function less efficiently or even “short circuit” the electrical impulses, causing arrhythmias or even heart failure.