The new addition to the Stoller Center came with the artificial grass turf that was placed in the field house this year. The turf added a whole different feel to the dynamic of the building, because Pacific is the only college in the country to have an indoor turf facility. The addition in the field house allows our athletic teams such as softball, baseball, lacrosse and football to practice inside, especially on rainy days when softball and baseball are unable to use their own fields.
This brings up an important question.
With so much use, does anyone take the time to clean the turf? As far as we know, there is not a drainage system below the turf and since it is indoors, naturally it will not clean itself as it would if it were outside and the rain would wash sweat, blood and other contaminants away. So does anyone really realize that when they play on this turf that it is covered in bodily fluids and other grime from hundreds of sweaty athletes?
I feel that the Stoller Center staff is doing a good job in trying to perk up such an old facility in order to attract new students and athletes to Pacific. But did anyone stop to think that the turf is a breeding ground for diseases such as Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, which is a bacterium that causes infections in different parts of the body. It’s tougher to treat than most strains of staphylococcus aureus- or staph- because it’s resistant to some commonly used antibiotics.
I have a friend, who wishes to remain anonymous, who recently contracted a MRSA infection and said she believes she got it from the field house. When staff members in the Stoller Center confronted her about her condition they asked her if she got it from the field house. Being unsure, she told them, “I am not sure where I got it from,” because she didn’t want to point the finger without being 100 p ercent sure, but told me that is what she suspects.
The point I am trying to make here is that we have a facility in the Stoller Center that the school spent a lot of money on and the supervisors in the field house, as far as we know, are not doing a good enough job keeping it clean, if at all.
Keeping those who use the field house safe from deadly infections such as MRSA should be a top priority. For all we know, there could have been and possibly will be more outbreaks of MRSA if those in the Stoller Center do nothing to have the turf field sanitized on a regular basis.
Someone needed to make this point known to our campus, because if we let this issue slide, we could have a MRSA epidemic on our hands. I would rather have someone speak up about it then let that happen.
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