AUSTIN, Texas — Before Texas' first game fo the 2020 football season, students with tickets for the University of Texas at Austin game were required to take a coronavirus test before entering Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium.
Of the 1,198 students who were tested before the Longhorns game, 95 tested positive for COVID-19 and 1,103 tested negative, according to a UT spokesman. That means nearly 8% of the student ticket-holders tested positive prior to the Sept. 12 game against UT El Paso.
According to UT Athletics, 15,337 people attended the UT-UTEP game, fewer than the 25% expected.
Days before the game, UT Athletics announced that only Big Ticket holders who receive a negative COVID-19 test result will have the opportunity to claim a game ticket.
Since the start of classes for the fall semester on Aug. 26, 340 students have tested positive for coronavirus, according to the university's COVID-19 dashboard. On Sept. 10 KVUE reported that three coronavirus clusters in West Campus near the school have resulted in about 100 positive COVID-19 cases.
Some of the game day positive results were previously accounted for in UT's reporting system, but 69 new results will be added to the dashboard.
The average positivity rate in the State of Texas is 6.9%, as of Sept. 11. The positivity rate in the Austin metro area is 7.46% as of Sept. 11.
Austin Travis County's Interim Health Director, Dr. Mark Escott, the goal is to get the positivity rate to fall below 5%.
While we are moving in the right direction, we are still in stage three of the risk- based guidelines, which means we still have to practice social distancing and not gather in groups larger than 10.
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