Detroit Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford Tim Fuller-USA TODAY Sports

Kelly Stafford blasts NFL over husband Matthew Stafford's false-positive COVID-19 test

Originally posted on Sportsnaut | By Jesse Reed | Last updated 8/4/20

Kelly Stafford, wife of Detroit Lions star quarterback Matthew Stafford, is displeased at the NFL over the way it handled his COVID-19 results.

In an Instagram post shared Tuesday, Kelly Stafford shared that the “past four days have been somewhat of a nightmare” after believing that her husband was positive for COVID-19.

Of course, not only did the Staffords believe he had it, but so did everyone in their community given the public nature of the Lions QB being placed on the reserve/COVID-19 list last weekend.

That exposure ended up putting the Stafford family in a tough spot. Kelly Stafford shared in her Instagram post that she experienced hostility at a grocery store, that her kids were “harassed and kicked off a playground,” that she was forced to wait in her car to pick up food, and that people close to them had to take tests just to go back to work.

Then she laid into the NFL for all of that.

“I blame the NFL for not holding themselves accountable. These are people’s lives and livelihoods that are in those results in THEIR test sites,” Stafford wrote. “Maybe we should be absolutely positive a person has covid before releasing that info to the world. I’m sharing our experience because I don’t want it happening to any other family that plays for this league.”

Here’s the full post:

View this post on Instagram

@nfl @nfl @nfl I would also like people to know.. if you saw me out and about after this, it was because we already knew it was a false positive. We would never chance endangering anyone with this virus. If we have learned anything in the past two years, it’s that we know the value of health and the health of others.

A post shared by Kelly Stafford (@kbstafford89) on Aug 4, 2020 at 1:52pm PDT

On Tuesday, the Lions placed Stafford on the active roster after he had been on the reserve/COVID-19 list. He never had the coronavirus, and he tested negative three times before being activated.

The reason he ended up on the list to begin with is that there was a false-positive test.

On the one hand, the NFL is doing what is has to in order to keep an outbreak from happening. It’s easy to understand why he was on the list. On the other hand, the Stafford family endured some hardship over the public way that protocol was handled, and it’s totally understandable why Kelly is so frustrated right now.

This article first appeared on Sportsnaut and was syndicated with permission.

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