Kelly Stafford blasts NFL for COVID response after Matthew’s false-positive

Today, the Detroit Lions announced Matthew Stafford had been activated from the reserve/COVID-19 list. Per their official team statement, Stafford received a false positive after testing negative twice, and he tested negative three times after the false positive. He’ll be permitted to return to the Allen Park facility on Wednesday, but his wife, Kelly, is not happy with the process she and her family had to go through over the past four days.

In a lengthy Instagram post Tuesday afternoon, Kelly detailed all the stress she had to deal with following the false negative, even after they knew Matthew did not have the virus. Specifically, she expresses her frustration with the league after Matthew’s medical status was announced publicly—via the reserve/COVID-19 list—before anyone even confirmed that he actually had the virus.

Here is the full text from Kelly’s Instagram post;

“The past four days have been somewhat of a nightmare. For 24 hours, we believed my husband was positive for covid.. We were all tested the day after and we were all negative including Matthew..then he tested negative again, then again, again, and again.

After his second negative, we were made adware [sic] of the ‘false positives’ and how this was one of those cases.

I have been losing my mind because of how my Family has been treated since my husband was put on COVID-IR.

Even after we knew it was false positive, our school told us they were not allowed back, I was approached in a grocery store and told I was ‘endangering others,’ my kids were harassed and kick off a playground, I was told I needed to wait in my car when trying to pick up food, and people closest to us had to get tested just so they could go back to work.. and that’s just to name a few things. I don’t blame these scenarios on any of the people directly involved.. I understand where they are coming from, but I do blame the @NFL. 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. 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.

We are thankful for those who called, texted, emailed and showed concern for matthew and our family. Your thoughts during this strange, difficult time are greatly appreciated.. but we are all absolutely fine and feeling great. Thank God for that.”

Important to note here that the NFL only announces when a player is placed on the reserve/COVID-19 list. Remember, that does not necessarily mean they have even tested positive for the virus. You may also be placed on the list if you came into close contact with an infected person. Stafford’s positive test was first revealed by MMQB’s Albert Breer.

Still, it’s easy to understand Kelly’s frustrations, given the hardships she was put through.