Hockey Canada recently released
its Return to Hockey Safety Guidelines. In addition, the Hockey Canada Board of
Directors have announced that Members may resume sanctioned activities where
appropriate, in accordance with government and health authority directives, and
Hockey Canada’s Return to Hockey safety protocol.
Within the Return
to Hockey Safety Guidelines, Hockey Canada has provided information on how to
prepare your league/association for a return to hockey, hygiene, return-to-play
protocols and the use of facilities.
Hockey Canada’s Return to Hockey Safety Guidelines can be found here:
https://cdn.hockeycanada.ca/hockey-canada/Exclusive/return-to-hockey/downloads/HC_RTH_Safety-GUIDELINES_EN.pdf
Hockey Canada’s Safety Protocol FAQ’s can be found here:
https://www.hockeycanada.ca/en-ca/exclusive/return-to-hockey/plans/safety
The Ontario Hockey Federation is encouraged by this announcement and will be releasing its Return to Hockey Plan shortly.
All current OHF information can be found here:
https://www.ohf.on.ca/risk-management/return-to-hockey-covid-19-response
What this means:
- It will be up to each individual province and municipality to determine the timing of their return to play which will be based on the directive of local health authorities
- When hockey does return, there will be numerous changes to what we are used to seeing
- It will be staged approach in that traditional 5 on 5 hockey, etc will not be experienced in stage 1 of return to play
- Authority lies with our Health authorities and we take our guidance from them