EDMONTON – In response to rising COVID-19 case numbers, Alberta Minister of Health Tyler Shandro announced stringent new regulations on the province’s popular coughing competitions.
“Albertans assembling in bars and community centres to cough directly in each other’s faces must now cease their activity by 10:00 pm, the hour at which COVID grows more powerful,” Minister Shandro told reporters. “Unless, of course, overtime is needed to determine a winner.”
Competitors must also wear masks whenever they are not coughing, preparing to cough, or receiving another player’s cough. Other events newly restricted by the province include kissing booths, the 2020 North American Face Licking Championships, and games of “Guess Whose Spittle?”, all of which must now operate at 75% capacity and conclude by 10:00 pm, before starting right back up at 8:00 am the next morning.
“We know this is a tremendous sacrifice,” Shandro continued. “But by only spewing saliva directly at each other for fourteen hours a day, we can and will beat this disease.”
In response, the Alberta Coughing Confederation declared the new rules “a tremendous assault on both our beloved game and our freedoms” and “an insult to the memory of provincial champion Scott Holland,” who died of COVID last week.
