A Call to Action to Support the Health + Fitness Industry through COVID-19

on Monday, governor Ducey ordered all gyms / fitness facilities/studios / group exercise classes to shut down to slow the spread of covid19

Also on Monday, countless gyms, fitness facilities, group classes, and studios refused to comply.

Today’s post is a plea to the fitness industry to reconsider. This is also a plea to each and every person in Arizona (or around the world) to support in any way you can.

Please read the whole article and watch the video linked at the end.

who I am and why I’m writing this

Hi! My name is Mallory Fox and I'm a Doctor of Health Science. I studied public health in grad school and have an understanding of hospital policies, procedures, and organizational structure.

I am a small business owner of a health and fitness company here in Arizona (the new epicenter for covid19). I’ve been a small business owner for seven years, and have been in the fitness industry for fifteen years locally.

Most important, I am a human who is really distressed and angry and frustrated and scared. I've been angry for a while. I was on a call yesterday with a couple of great friends who said to me, “Mallory, I know there's something you want to say. It seems like it's really heavy on your heart and we want you to know that you have a safe space to say it here."

I was really grateful they cared enough to ask. So I told them. I told them I’m angry, frustrated, confused, and feel helpless. They reminded me that it's okay to be angry. Society teaches me that as a well-educated privileged white woman that I need to hide my anger or I need to zen it away (which is why you'll often see me on social media and on this blog teaching mindfulness exercises, movement, and yoga). These are tools that help me to cope with the enormously difficult emotions that I am facing.

The truth is, we are all facing enormously challenging times.

that is why I’m speaking out

This is not a call-out.

This is not a call to cancel any specific gym or person.

This is a plea to do the really hard work for the greater good.

I'm struggling with the words as I write this today.

I choose to believe that each person who has chosen to defy the order to shut down their gym is doing it because it's what they believe to be right.

I'm not here to tell you what's right.

I'm not here to judge you for choices that you're making.

What I am here to do is share from a perspective of how these choices affect our entire state.

challenges

Our state is a giant cluster**** right now. Our ICUs are completely overwhelmed (currently 91% occupancy). Our doctors, nurses, and other health care workers are completely overwhelmed. I know this because I have clients and friends who are thoracic physicians, ICU nurses, and EMTs.

I know this because I have a couple of friends who are young, healthy, and fit, who have covid and were turned away from the emergency room because they're “not sick enough”. Even though they're sick enough to go to the emergency room to get help, they're not “sick enough” to get care.

Worse, the burden to decide who is “sick enough” falls on over-worked, good-hearted medical professionals working long hours, risking their safety by facing covid daily.

Coronavirus, being new, is a virus that we don't have a black and white, simple answer for exactly how it spreads and how/who it will affect. Coronavirus continues to morph. We continue to learn about it.

Research and best practices

I could chat about research all day because I am a giant nerd, but what I'm also here to tell you is we do know that wearing a mask will slow the spread.

Unfortunately, wearing a mask (or not) has become a political statement instead of a public health issue.

Let me be clear: wearing a mask in public is the simplest way to be a good citizen. If you’d like to learn more about how masks help slow the spread of coronavirus, please read the article I’ve linked.

Many people are asymptomatic or pre-symptomatic and infect others unknowingly.

This graphic powerfully illustrates why social distancing is vital to slowing the spread of coronavirus.

When masks and social distancing are utilized, we can stop the spread of coronavirus. Countless countries have accomplished this already, while we continue to break records (in the worst way) with our cases.

Thank you to California for this helpful graphic on why masks can help slow the spread of coronavirus.

The concern with fitness centers of any size

There are four factors in how we believe coronavirus is transmitted from person-to-person:

• time spent

• proximity to others

• environment

• activity

One reason that gyms have been told to shut down is because when we exercise, when we breathe heavy, we expel more droplets. In a fitness class, all four factors are present for optimal transmission of covid.

In Arizona, one of the reasons that the virus is spreading so fast in the heat of summer (when we expect bacteria and germs to die) is because air conditioning and fans carry droplets fat and wide.

While exercising, we breathe harder. At an indoor gym, there’s a much greater risk of covid transmission since it’s contraindicated to wear a mask when working out. Even if there's no one six feet around me, if I’m asymptomatic or presymptomstic I can infect others in the gym.

You don’t have to just take my word for it. A research study from South Korea (a country that has excelled in contact tracing and stopping the spread of covid) found that several cases came from a fitness class.

Friends, all of these facts are why I am complying with governors order to shut down my practice

I'm not here to tell other health and fitness professionals that they're in the wrong or tell you how to run your business.

But what I am here to do is to beg you to look at your part in this. Look at your platform and how your voice and your example can help protect the public.

What I struggle with the most is that incredible people are hurting right now.

I know, as someone in the health and fitness industry, how much our clients and members rely on their appointments/classes/communities to enrich their mental health and improve their physical health.

I know how hard it is to tell your clients that you have to shut down.

I know how hard it is to tell your family that you've had to shut down and you're not sure when you're going to have another paycheck.

I know how hard it is to have the conversation with the landlord that you've been forced to shut down. You're not independently wealthy and you aren't sure if you can continue the financial obligation that you made.

I know that because I'm also living this. I experienced all of this myself at a couple other points in my life. One, when I had a traumatic brain injury two years ago and was not able to work for a very long time. The second time was in March when the gyms had to shut down for the first time.

I know how painful it is.

And I don't say it lightly that closing down is still the right thing to do.

I know it’s not fair. It’s not right. But you don’t have to do it alone.

here's what I'm asking of everyone

If you're not a business owner or a member of the health and fitness industry:

Please support the health and fitness industry right now.

If your gym has had to close; if your fitness center or studio has had to close and you can afford to do so, please support them. Continue to pay your membership. Pay for sessions. Ask them what they need. If you have skills that can assist them with marketing, administrative work, legal documents, communication, or any other special skills, please offer.

If you don’t have spare money or time, there is one huge way you can help that doesn’t cost a thing.

What we all have the power to do and the opportunity to do is to reach out to the people and to vote for the people who are going to protect the rights and the financial health of the people who are being asked to make a big sacrifice.

I can't stress this enough.

A large group of professionals have been told to shut down their businesses and livelihoods. I personally know ten trainers from my gym who can’t afford to rent space anymore. I know of several studios who weren’t able to reopen after the first shutdown.

I know that the reason many facilities refuse to close is because they know they won’t survive another month of closure.

if we are asked to make this sacrifice, there must be a system to provide for us

I was completely unfamiliar with unemployment as a self-employed individual until March when the government shut everything down. I heard from the news that I now qualify for unemployment due to the disaster.

So, I filed for unemployment assistance. I did all my paperwork, promptly. I did everything right. I applied for the EIDL and the PPP, special programs for small businesses to get through the disaster.

I didn't get a single paycheck.

For ten weeks, I didn’t receive a dime. Countless phone calls, hours on hold with a call center. A different answer every time I finally connected with someone.

Im not alone in this experience. I’m in a group of five thousand people on Facebook with similar experiences.

If Brian, my husband, didn’t make enough to support us, I wouldn’t have a roof over my head today.

Trying to rebuild in the midst of a pandemic is another unique challenge.

I don’t blame business owners for not wanting to close their doors and hope that they may get assistance someday to survive.

Now we have been asked yet again to shut down our places of employment and dealing with that uncertainty again. Everyone in Arizona is struggling. Everyone is affected in some way by covid.

The only way we're going to get through this is to work together

How you can help:

• write to Congress and ask them to extend the pandemic unemployment assistance for people whose employment has been limited by covid19. This coverage is set to expire at the end of this month.

Why this is important:

• when people have lost income, the bills that get prioritized are home, car, food—as they should be! As a result, personal training, health and fitness memberships get cut.

So even though my place of business will hopefully open after the 30 day shutdown, there's no guarantee that I'm going to have clients who are able to pay me when I return to work.

Full disclosure: I haven't received a paycheck since March because countless clients had to leave and go back home months early. I also owe people for sessions that they paid in advance and haven’t been able to use.

When gyms shut down the first time, I immediately pivoted. I took my business online. I created online on-demand programs. I offered virtual sessions. I also had to pay out money in order to create the platform to deliver my services.

The best way that you can support anyone in the health and fitness industry is to show up for them.

Financially if you can, supporting with your talents, sharing their content, offering emotional support or encouragement. And most important, please reach out, speak out, and keep our government accountable for doing what they say that they will do to provide for those they’ve barred from work.

I can see all of the sides of what we're dealing with right now because I'm living it too.

I can see all of the sides and I know that the only way that we're going to survive this is to come together and to do what's best for the greater good.

We have to do the right thing for the people who are making those sacrifices.

I didn’t plan to speak on this today. This morning, I was asked how we should respond to a negative comment about a fellow fitness leader. After that happened, I knew I needed to speak out. I filmed this video and posted it on Instagram. You can watch by clicking the button.

My motivation

I wanted to use my education and my own experiences as a small business owner, as a healthcare professional, and as a human who cares greatly about my fellow health and fitness professionals. The personal trainers, the gym owners, the yoga studios, and everyone who's being asked to make these giant sacrifices.

I also wanted to shed some light on some of the big problems that we're having with the system and to ask you to help make a difference.

I am open to any feedback that you have.

Please be kind to each other. Please stay home as much as you possibly can. Please wear a mask when you do go out and be kind to yourself be kind to others. Thank you.