Managing Sport and Leisure

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Effects of COVID-19 on society and sport a national

response

Marko Begović

To cite this article: Marko Begović (2020): Effects of COVID-19 on society and sport a national
response, Managing Sport and Leisure, DOI: 10.1080/23750472.2020.1779115

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MANAGING SPORT AND LEISURE
https://doi.org/10.1080/23750472.2020.1779115

Effects of COVID-19 on society and sport a national response

Marko Begović
Deutsche Sporthochschule Köln, Köln, Germany

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

This paper represents a continuation of the Parnell et al. (2020) commentary on Received 22 April 2020
the outbreak of COVID-19. In times of crisis, a country’s resilience, its Accepted 3 June 2020
institutional response, economy, and socio-political dynamics are put to the
KEYWORDS
test. Montenegro, like many other countries, is ill-prepared for tackling the COVID-19; sport; physical
unprecedented health challenge that COVID-19 represents as well as the activity; Montenegro
compounding broader economic and socio-political implications. The
government of Montenegro established the National Coordination Body for
Communicable Diseases (NKT). Even though the NKT is set as a multisectoral
and multidisciplinary body to coordinate the implementation of the broader
health and socio-economic measures, no representative from the
Montenegro’s sport system has taken part in decision-making processes.
Although economic dimension has been highlighted, the social and health
values of sport and physical activity have been neglected largely
undermining their crucial potential for addressing maintaining activities while
respecting physical distancing policies, in the context of restricted movement.

Introduction
This commentary serves to provide an analysis
of the effects of COVID-19 on society and
sport and a country’s readiness to face chal-
lenges that go beyond health-related ones.
From its very start in late 2019 to now, with
over 2 million confirmed cases worldwide in
over 150 countries, there is a broad consensus
that the world needs sweeping preventative
and restrictive strategies to deal with halting
the transmission and dealing with implications.
Xiong and Yan (2020) concluded that preven-
tive strategies are needed to limit the further
spread of the COVID-19. However, the strategies
differ from country to country. COVID-19 suc-
cessfully disrupted every segment of the
global society, and sport and physical activities
are no exception. In most of the countries,
sporting calendars, competitions, even practices
are suspended. In the days that followed the
announcement of the pandemic, the Tokyo
Olympics, the UEFA 2020 have all been post-
poned until 2021, and all major leagues sus-
pended their events. As Hall (2020) noted, all
three main sources for income, broadcasting,
commercial, and matchday revenues will be
strongly hit. The media were focused on politi-
cal and economic side effects noting that the
sports industry with an estimated worth over
$471bn in 2018 will be losing billions over the
coming period (Gough, 2020). Certainly, it will
take some time before organizations of mega-
events resume their activities (Parnell et al.,
2020). From the start of the pandemic, the
social and health values of sport and physical
activity have been largely neglected.

CONTACT Marko Begović marko.inovativnost@gmail.com

© 2020 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
2 M. BEGOVIĆ
Montenegro at a glance
On March 17, Montenegro recorded its first
COVID-19 case. As of April 19, there were 314
confirmed cases in Montenegro, from which
208 active. A set of policies aimed at locking
down the economy and implementing a strict
lockdown to enforce physical distancing
seemed to work in terms of halting the trans-
mission. However, it is believed that the impli-
cations of the policies on people’s physical
and mental wellbeing will likely be felt for
years and are at present difficult to ascertain
other than a collective awareness that they are
fundamental. A lockdown is already having a
significant impact on economies worldwide, in
which political and public decisions are in a
grey area between leaning towards autocracy,
crippling democratic institutions, and values.
In times of crisis, a country’s resilience, its insti-
tutional response, economy, and socio-political
dynamics are constantly being put to the test.
A few days ago, the International Monetary
Fund (IMF) released revised forecasts for the
global economy for 2020, indicating a decline
of 3%. Looking at Montenegro as a micro-level
case, its economy will decline by 9% (IMF,
2020). Since 2006, public debt has been on
the constant rise, from 30% of GDP to 75% of
GDP in 2019. Montenegro has 24 local govern-
ments, 17 of which are filling their budgets
from the Equalization Fund (allocation of
funds from the government based on their
underdevelopment). Tourism represents one
of the major sectors, generating an amount
equivalent to a quarter of Montenegro’s GDP
with revenues around € 1.1 billion. If the lock-
down continues throughout summer this year,
these revenues may fall by 90%, which will
lead to inevitably massive external borrowing.
The unemployment rate has risen from 16% to
25% with already 25% living at the poverty
line (Monstat, 2018). The country’s credit
rating has been downgraded substantially,
along with €635 million debt from the 18,000
companies with blocked accounts and the
gray economy accounting for between 30 and
35% of GDP annually, reflected in chronic real-
sector unemployment, lack of funding sources
and inability of the private sector to maintain
productivity and employment levels. Vuković
(2020) in his research concluded that “if COVID-
19 pandemic ends in June 2020 without the
virus returning in the fall, the economy will
need at least 3 full years to recover.”
Strully (2009) found that job loss will lead to a
decrease across all health outcomes by 54%.
Stress, anxiety, and depression additionally
expose the general population further to non-
communicable diseases such as cardiovascular
diseases and diabetes. Pfefferbaum and North
(2020) suggested that “public health emergen-
cies may affect the health, safety and wellbeing”
(p. 1). Alessi (2020) further stressed the unprece-
dented implications of the COVID-19 on health
care systems that are not prepared to deal with
the extent of the crisis and in many cases incap-
able of providing general services to non-COVID-
19 patients. According to the Ministry of Health
(MH) Program for control and prevention of
non-communicable diseases for 2019-2021,
NCDs are accounted for 75% of the total
number of deaths (MH, 2019). The data from
the Diabetes Registry indicates that among
new cases (2832), 99% are adults’ cases, with
92% of which have type 2 diabetes mellitus.
Also, the circulatory system diseases were
present in about 30% of the adult population
in Montenegro and 55.1% of adults had over-
weight/obesity (OWOb). Also, due to the lock-
down measures, according to the medical
officials, there is a significant increase (up to
112%) of the number of patients being admitted
to the ER. Changing lifestyles and urbanization
coupled with air pollution and the changing
climate led the World Health Organization
(WHO) to list obesity among children and pre-
adolescents as major health-related problems
(WHO, 1995). A recent survey conducted by the
Institute for Public Health, covering about 3.5
thousand kids aged between six and eight
years within 100 schools in Montenegro
 MANAGING SPORT AND LEISURE 3

confirmed these results. Childhood obesity, the
prevalence of overweight, including obesity is
prevailing, 37% in boys’ and 29% in girls’ popu-
lation. Strully (2009) concluded that “there are
true health costs” associated with economic
fallout (p. 242). Therefore, lockdown measures
with economic insecurity presented the above,
are likely to compound the existing and intro-
duce additional, cascading risks affecting the
general population.
Institutional response
The Law on Protection of Communicable Dis-
eases of the Population (Government of Monte-
negro, 2018) provides a mandate and stipulates
measures for prevention, suppression, and era-
dication of NCDs together with standards for
epidemiological surveillance, competent enti-
ties for their implementation and method of
providing funds for their implementation.
According to the provision of Article 9 of this
Law, the Ministry of Health, on the proposal of
the Institute of Public Health, establishes a Com-
mission for the Protection of the Population
from Infectious Diseases. This Commission is
chaired by a representative of the Ministry of
Health, and the Commission is composed of
Doctor of Specialist Medicine (epidemiology,
infectiology, microbiology, pediatrics, pneumo-
physiology) and representatives of the Ministry
of Health and the Ministry of Agriculture.
In response to the COVID-19 related epide-
miological situation, the minister of health
formed the National Coordination Body for
Communicable Diseases (NKT) to manage the
crisis. The NKT is set as a multisectoral and mul-
tidisciplinary body to coordinate the implemen-
tation of broader measures during the time of
broader health and socio-economic crisis.
Since February 28, following the outbreak of a
worldwide pandemic, the NKT adopted 89
interim measures and 14 recommendations up
to the April 16 Table 1.
Further, the NKT proposed and the govern-
ment of Montenegro adopted a decision that
major sport facilitates across the country
should be prepared to treat patients infected
with COVID-19. These measures included adopt-
ing a curfew on weekdays from 19:00–05:00,
Saturday from 13:00–05:00 and Sunday from
11:00–05:00. The NKT has banned all public
gatherings, including religious ceremonies, and
criminally prosecuting individuals who did not
comply. With the approval of the Agency for Per-
sonal Data Protection, the NKT disclosed the
names of individuals who were ordered to self-
isolate or home quarantine for mandatory 14
days. However, the composition of the NKT is
reflecting political parties on power and
elected politicians are making the decisions.
The accumulation of power within the NKT has
weakened and subordinated the Parliament of
Montenegro, while blocking any initiative
coming from the civil society organizations
(CSO) and opposition, in challenging these
decisions on the ground of right for privacy
and stressing that declaring a state of emer-
gency is a constitutional mandatory prerequisite
for those measures.
Ministry of Sport and Youth (MS), the Council
for Sport, and the Montenegrin Olympic

Table 1. NKT Measures and Recommendations.

Date Measures/Recommendations Decision
March 11 Measure 7 - Sport events to be held without spectators.
- Arrivals of teams from the most affected areas (China, Italy) to be suspended
March 12 Measure 12 - Suspended all sporting events.
March 15 Measure 28 - Closed all fitness centers.
March 17 Measure 42 - Closed all indoor sporting facilities.
March 18 Measure 54 - Closed all outdoor sporting and recreational facilities.
March 24 Measure 63 - Suspended public gathering for more than 2 adult persons at the same time.
April 8 Measure 79 - Suspended public gathering for more than 1 adult person at the same time.
April 15 Measure 89 - All measures shall be extended until April 30.
4 M. BEGOVIĆ
Committee (COK) have been particularly silent
since the first measures were put in place and
none of their representatives have taken part in
the NKT. Earlier this year, the MS adopted a
decision on the allocation of funds for the
implementation of programs by sport organiz-
ations in 2020. Most of the funds were trans-
ferred directly to the National Sport
Federations (NSF) and dedicated to the final
preparation for Tokyo2020. These funds were
predominantly set aside for competition pro-
grams in the Olympic year, and for paying the
NSFs administration. However, due to the sus-
pension of the global sport events and all sport-
ing activities internally, the athletes and coaches
primarily are most affected. Although some ath-
letes are covered by the MS decision on scholar-
ship for categorized athletes, the majority of
athletes are not and are strongly impacted by
the lockdown measures. Many other athletes
that have not been covered by the MS financial
instruments have been engaged in rigorous
preparation for various competitions, where for
some of them the lockdown will most likely
end their sporting career. Besides financial
aspects, lockdown measures are heavily
affecting athletes both physical and mental well-
being. As the NKT measures affected all, athletes
are faced with mandatory isolation and no struc-
tured practice at all. According to Campbell and
Turner (2018), elite athletes should continue
their regular practice schedules without a
specific risk of respiratory illness. Besides the
physical importance of having needed training
load (Schwellnus et al., 2016), it is important to
keep practice routine to reduce the risk of
anxiety and depression (Martin et al., 2009). As
the sport has broader societal and health
effects, adopted measures are limiting the
general population to have regular physical
activity and will additionally affect the adverse
health status of the population. According to
Hull et al. (2020), “participation in some form of
physical activity or sport is a core component
of maintaining a healthy lifestyle and is undoubt-
edly an important public health message for
those residing in geographical areas enforcing
isolation” (p. 1). More specifically, regular and
moderate physical activity proved to have posi-
tive effects on the immune system response to
respiratory infections such as COVID-19.
Hammami et al. (2020) concluded that “imple-
menting an adapted physical training pro-
gramme at home … will decrease the negative
physiological and psychological impact” of lock-
down measures (p. 2). Therefore, Parnell et al.
(2020) rightly underlined the importance of “re-
thinking” sport in its current form as it is
obvious that nothing is going to be the same
anymore (p. 5).
A way forward
A healthy society presupposes sustainable con-
ditions, ranging from natural and environ-
mental to appropriate social and economic
policies with institutions capable of facilitating
the population’s needs on the one hand, and
facing challenges, on the other hand. At the
national level, it is important to act in concert
and have a comprehensive strategy in place
with coordinated actions to deal with the
health emergency and the consequences it
has on the socio-economic vitality of the
country. These measures shall include the for-
mation of a multisectoral body, composed of
representatives of state administration bodies
in charge of sport, health, and finance, on the
one hand, and representatives of the sport
movement, on the other. The current strategic
document, the National Plan for Sport serves
as a major political landmark and expiries in
two years. However, due to its composition,
the document does not provide an appropriate
framework dealing with this crisis (Begović,
2019). Considering the effects of a lockdown,
the Government should adopt a two-year recov-
ery plan for sport in Montenegro that would be
broken down into three parts:
. Competitive sport - provide a special fund for
athletes and sports workers (coaches and

other professionals) and continued support
for scholarship holders (until the Tokyo
Games) leaning towards IOC decision to
prolong funding of “Olympic Scholarships
for Athletes” through the Olympic Solidarity
programme;
. Organizational – provide support to grass-
roots organizations (clubs) to compensate
for part of lost profits. Based on the Law of
the State Aid Control, the Government
adopted the Program of support to the
economy and employees to mitigate the
negative effects of the COVID-19. (Govern-
ment, of Montenegro, 2020). This program
articulates the importance of subsidizing
“closed activities”, where the sport is among
those activities. The Government determined
to compensate the amount of taxes and con-
tributions to the minimum wage and 100%
net minimum wages for employees of the
company;
. Sport for all and children’s sports – in 2019,
the MS subsidized the membership fee up
to 50%. However, since the pandemic crisis
is already strongly impacting Montenegro’s
economy, the MS should revise their decision
and enable subsidies up to 100% for children
under 14 years from 2020 until 2022.
This last measure is especially important
because, in times of crisis, parents are forced to
economize. Furthermore, after the 2008 econ-
omic crisis, a startling decline in the participation
rate of the youngest in organized sport was glob-
ally triggered. The funding mechanism should
consist of an existing state fund for sport, reven-
ues from the organization of the Small States
Games in 2019, and revenues from the profit of
the game of chance authorities. Taking into
account the contagiousness of COVID-19, the
MS along with the sport movement should
develop a plan for enabling athletes to resume
practices in a controlled environment.
As the sport has a broader societal and
health effects, adopted measures are limiting
the general population to have regular physical
MANAGING SPORT AND LEISURE 5
activity. However, the WHO (2020) stressed that
“regular physical activity benefits both the body
and mind. It can reduce high blood pressure,
help manage weight, and reduce the risk of
heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes, and
various cancers.” Considering the contagious-
ness of the COVID-19, it is expected that the
MS and the MH will develop a procedure that
is in line with the WHO recommendations,
especially on physical distancing, but enabling
the population access to the public places and
nature. Subsequent work, research, and policy
action are needed both locally and regionally
on governance and structure of the sport
system, in order to advocate for more resilient
institutions of sport, capable of dealing with
the future crisis.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the
author.
ORCID
Marko Begović http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5768-2717
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