The Flyers Are out There Just Trying Not to Get the Mumps

Photo Credit: Eric Hartline-USA TODAY Sports

There’s a bit of a mumps outbreak going on in the NHL right now. As Canada’s SportsNet points out:

It started in Anaheim and plagued the Ducks, who had three players affected. The Minnesota Wild was next, with five victims. Tanner Glass of the New York Rangers then came down with it, and as recently as Wednesday, the New Jersey Devils had two players turn up sick.

The Flyers beat those Devils last night, so they were — at the very least — mumps-adjacent. Ron Hextall told Mike DeNardo that he’s offered his players the mumps vaccine, and “we’ve got it covered as much as we can. Clean buildings and wash your hands and vaccines and everything else you can do.”

How is this all being spread? Well, people just can’t stop spitting at one another. Dr. Judith Aberg, chief of the infectious diseases division at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital, told SportsNet “You see the hits that they have, and sometimes the spraying of saliva … I am surprised we haven’t actually seen this before.”

But is it even a big deal? Let’s look at the symptoms of the saliva-spread virus:

Swollen, painful salivary glands on one or both sides of your face (parotitis)
Fever
Headache
Weakness and fatigue
Loss of appetite
Pain while chewing or swallowing

Actually, you know what? Let’s go back and add one of the complications in there:

Orchitis: causes one or both testicles to swell in males who’ve reached puberty. Orchitis is painful, but it rarely leads to sterility — the inability to father a child

Pretty sure Chip Kelly has had the mumps for years now. But get that vaccine, guys