Dana White reveals UFC have spent staggering £12.7m this year on coronavirus testing to keep MMA fights going
DANA WHITE has revealed the UFC have forked out a staggering £12.7million this year on coronavirus testing. The MMA company were the first organization to bring sports back in America during the first wave of the pandemic back in May. Promoter White was faced with several hurdles as he attempted to put together UFC 249, having […]
DANA WHITE has revealed the UFC have forked out a staggering £12.7million this year on coronavirus testing.
The MMA company were the first organization to bring sports back in America during the first wave of the pandemic back in May.
Promoter White was faced with several hurdles as he attempted to put together UFC 249, having to twice cancel the pay-per-view show.
But after professional sports in Florida were able to resume he staged the show through rigorous testing of its fighters, teams and staff for COVID-19.
Since then the UFC have put on numerous cards both in the USA and on Fight Island in Abu Dhabi but it hasn’t been cheap.
White has revealed his company have spent a staggering £12.7m this year and the figure is only likely to increase in the new year.
He told TSN’s Aaron Bronsteter: “We’ve spent $17 million on COVID testing this year.
“And think about this — 1,470 UFC athletes, cornermen and staff were transported. 1,700 commercial flights, 34 charter flights.
“Everybody keeps talking about how difficult it is for some of these other sports because of the teams — we had 164 athletes from 40 different countries that competed this year.
“Oh and by the way, they were talking about how great it was that the NBA players had an 8.8% positivity rate? Ours was 0.8%.”
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White has also claimed that he’s not worried about the recent increase in positive coronavirus tests ahead of the UFC Vegas 17 card on December 19.
He added: “I just told you earlier, we have the lowest [positivity rate] out of all sports.
“When I say lowest, it’s not even in the same universe. So our system is pretty dialed in but you’re dealing with a virus — things are going to happen.”