ERROL PARKER | Editor-at-large | Contact
The Channel Country Rugby League has been postponed for a fortnight today after one player in the competition has tested positive for a new strain of the H1N1 swine flu virus.
Dave Marshall, a 20-year veteran of Betoota City CYMS, has been named as the player who’s been quarantined at the Base Hospital after popping in for a routine test upon returning from a Mildura business trip.
There were fears the 49-year-old fourth-grade prop brought the deadly coronavirus back to the Diamantina but more comprehensive testing has determined Dave is the patient zero of what experts have described as being ‘as dangerous as the pangolin’s kiss’.
It’s well-known in the rugby league community that Dave Marshall has been known to be a bit of a pig.
From his poor diet to his attitudes surrounding the role of women in society to what he thinks of asylum seekers, there’s little speculation that the diagnosis is correct.
Local health authorities are now making contact with the poor humans that Dave has been in contact with since his return from Victoria’s only real country town.
Virologists from Canberra are also on the way up to see just what in Christ is going on up here.
If you have been in close contact with Dave, please phone the Betoota Base Hospital and make an appointment to be tested.
More to come.
