Covid case at LR cancels games, quarantines students

A Lake Roosevelt student-athlete testing positive for COVID has led to students quarantining and basketball games being cancelled, but an outdoor graduation ceremony is still planned for Saturday.

Basketball games on June 4, 5, 7, and 8 were canceled as a result of the situation. 

A June 5 notice on the Raider’s athletic website announced that a student-athlete had tested positive for Covid resulting in the basketball teams quarantining. 

A June 7th update on the school’s Facebook page explained that in response, the school’s “admin team has been working diligently in cooperation with County and Tribal health authorities to contact trace, quarantine, and test students affected by this situation.”

“The positive case resulted in possible exposures on our senior trip as well as on our basketball and cheer teams,” the update says. “We did additional testing before basketball games last weekend and took appropriate action when a student tested positive.”

Superintendent Paul Turner told The Star Tuesday that a cheerleader who had been on the senior trip to California had tested positive for Covid and had also attended an away basketball game, riding there with both the boys’ and girls’ teams on the school bus.

The June 7 Facebook update explained that “in cooperation with [Indian Health Services], we tested our student athletes and seniors who were on the senior trip. We are waiting on final test reporting and will report out more information as we have it available. All students who are affected by this situation are quarantined until we receive guidance from County and Tribal authorities.”

Turner said basketball players and all seniors were tested for Covid again on Monday, with the results coming back negative.

This led to the district receiving verbal approval from Okanogan County Public Health to reduce the quarantine time for students from 14 days to 10 days, he said.

With exposure to Covid being determined through contact tracing to have occurred on Tuesday, June 1, the 10 days of quarantine are up on Friday, June 11, in time for graduation to take place as planned on June 12.

Basketball is expected to resume next week.