The cold hard reality is that for 150-plus years in Australia we have been going to the races, cricket and footy matches and copious other sporting events without giving a thought to whether we might contract a cold, the flu, chicken pox or any number of communicable diseases from another person who might happen to be there.

And that includes a whole range of bugs that for some or all people might prove fatal.

We have hardly ever been conscious of social distancing, not shaking hands or additional hygienic practices.

Yet right now when we are doing all of that, we not prepared to engage fully in our traditional activities.

I've had all sorts of interactions recently with stakeholders - major and minor - whose approval is necessary for a sporting activity or event to go head. Some of their involvement is miniscule yet an almost standard response is that it is too risky for them right now.

Probe it a bit further to find out why, and they really don't know. For them it just is.

For the larger stakeholders the risk can be either legal or reputational. It's really clear that no one wants a coronavirus positive on or in connection with their patch of turf, however that might be defined.

So much of this is surely misplaced but present as a result of the way the fear of COVID-19 has been portrayed to society.

I am certain that some events have been cancelled for forthcoming editions simply because of fear or uncertainty about being able to develop the COVID-safe plan required of them. I have personally and I am aware of others who have been able to head some of these cancellations off at the pass by providing a template or preparing a document from scratch.

It's nowhere near as scary or difficult as very many people have wrongly perceived.

In many cases those who hire the venues out already have something in place that will cover the bulk of what is needed.

If things continue to go well, then it is essential that at some point in time - and sooner rather than later - our leaders provide the comfort needed to stop people worrying unnecessarily.

One way might be some sort of legislative action to provide legal protection to organisers who present their event in a safe manner, in accordance with their COVID-safe plan.

Event organisers have never been liable if a participant picks up a bug from someone, unless they were negligent in some overt way.

Our leaders should be re-iterating that's also the case here, and indeed if they feel it may not be, then to prepare and enact some legislation to make it so.

It's almost certain that many more events are going to be better and more safely organised from now on. Some may never have had an event plan other than the collective memory banks of those who have delivered them year after year.

It's hard to imagine that there are any positives to come out of the coronavirus pandemic but this is one of them.

And if it happens to have a side-effect of knocking some shonky or profit-hungry operators out of the events market sobeit.

Fortunately, in Tasmania at least, much of our grassroots participant activity has resumed without too much difficulty.

We were well-placed to do this given so much is volunteer driven and with a lower cost base. Government support to cover the incidental extra cost of compliance measures has been welcomed and removed a small but potentially critical road block for some clubs and competitions.

This was a great example of our leadership seeing a smaller issue and addressing it.

Now what's crucial is some substantive direction on the broader issue that seems to be causing traditional annual events, far more so than regular competition rosters, to take a year out. The big problem with that, if indeed it's actually unnecessary, is that it's so easy for one year off to become two and so on.

Just like some zombie businesses, it may well be that this becomes the moment for events that have become unviable to call it quits. But if it's not the case, we should do all we can to make sure that doesn't happen.