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Rockford schools investigating football player illnesses

Posted at 3:07 PM, Aug 24, 2016
and last updated 2016-08-24 22:30:03-04

ROCKFORD, Mich. -- The Rockford School District is looking into what made a group of football players sick.

Assistant Superintendent of Finance Mike Cuneo said Wednesday that the district was made aware of a group of players from the varsity football team becoming sick with symptoms similar to a stomach bug. He says it's too soon to determine exactly what the illness is, but they are taking precautions to ensure student safety.

“It is concerning.  Obviously anytime you have a group of 30 kids who have the same symptoms it is concerning. Because of the safety of those kids and how they feel and make sure it doesn’t spread to other kids because they see each other every day,” said Cuneo.

Cuneo said the school had its water tested in the spring, and results came back clean. He said that so far the potential outbreak has been contained to varsity players, even though they drank from the same water sources as other football players.

No other athletes from other fall sports are reporting illnesses.

Officials with Rockford schools have already reached out to the Kent County Health Department to see what should be done to prevent the illness from spreading, if it is a stomach bug.

“We have to stop short of calling this an outbreak at this point, because we really don’t know what’s going on. This is very new and very fresh and it’s going to take us digging in to find out what is really fact,” said Steve Kelso with the Kent County Health Department.

Rockford's football team has its first game this Friday night at home against Saline. The new school year begins next Monday.