Can indoor concerts be safe again?

Employees return to the office and children head to the summer camp. Everyday life after a pandemic may soon be like 2019.

But what about the pure joy of singing with your favorite artists crowded in the ocean of thousands of fans? When will live music come back?

The sunset concert at the Red Rocks Open Air Theater in Colorado on Tuesday night was a welcome sight for many music lovers, including Denver teacher Melinda Murphy.

Murphy told CNN that she might not have attended if the same concert took place indoors. The idea of ​​being in a crowd said, “Still I’m a little scared … indoors It’s a bit cramped to me, “she said.

To attend a large indoor live music event, you need to know the venue’s capacity and social distance plans before attending, and you need to wear a mask even if you are fully vaccinated. Said Murphy.

“I don’t think everyone in public without a mask is completely vaccinated,” she told CNN in the music.

Revised guidance from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention allows fully vaccinated individuals to go out indoors and outdoors without masks, return to normal conditions, and return to concerts. It was.

Joe Birchtord, president of Live Nation, one of the world’s largest entertainment companies, told CNN’s Julia Chatterley on Tuesday.

However, according to the latest data from the Axios-Ipsos Coronavirus Tracking Index, 37% of adults consider attending an indoor concert to be a major risk, and 48% consider it a small to moderate risk. Call, 14% say there is no risk at all.

So how dangerous is an indoor concert actually?

Large indoor event after Covid-19

Indoor sports leagues like the NBA have been spectating more recently, but concerts create a different situation. After the outbreak of Covid-19 in an Australian church, researchers blamed poor ventilation, the infectivity of the first patient, and the increased ability to spread the virus caused by the act of singing.

“Singing has been demonstrated to produce more respiratory aerosol particles and droplets than speaking,” the researchers published in a weekly report on CDC morbidity and mortality. I am writing in.

Few places are less pandemic-friendly than an indoor live concert sung by thousands of fans all at once. After months of social distance, Covid-19 restrictions, and blockades, some scientists find that the best way to understand how the coronavirus spreads to large indoor crowds is I decided to study it exactly.

There is growing scientific literature showing that large indoor concerts can be safely held with proper mitigation measures for Covid-19. However, some scientists, including the scientists who lead the study, reserve how widely these findings apply.

According to a recent publication in the Lancet Infectious Diseases Journal, a survey of 1,000 people at an indoor live music event in Barcelona last December found that the concert did not cause Covid-19 infection. I did.

Participants had to take the Covid-19 test before admission and always had to wear an N95 mask, but were able to sing and dance without social distance during the live performance. The venue was ventilated. Strengthening, implementing crowd guidance and control, participants had to use two smartphone apps to track contacts and communicate test results after the event.

However, the lead author of the study, Dr. Joseph Libre of the German Trias y Puyol University Hospital in Barcelona, ​​said the findings need to take context into account.

“It is important that our findings are taken into account in the light of the situation in Spain at the time, when the number of infected people was low and many restrictions were in place. As a result, our research is all about. It does not necessarily mean that the scale event is safe. “He said.

The study was conducted on December 12, 2020, but before both the Covid-19 variant and vaccination became widespread.

Libre says more research is needed on large-scale indoor events. Because he believes the findings depend on the prevalence of the virus in the community.

“Extensive vaccination campaigns, regional changes in incidence, and the emergence of more contagious SARS-CoV-2 variants all take into account as they can affect the interventions we have tested. More research is needed, including more people investigating different scenarios and policies, “local context,” Libre added.

Barcelona findings may serve as a model for events in countries with low vaccination rates and existing mask requirements, but high vaccination rates during the withdrawal of Covid-19 requirements So the findings probably no longer apply.

No need to look outside the UK for a maskless live concert model that includes a partially vaccinated population. In April and May 2021, the UK Government sponsored a series of large multi-day live events known as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP). These are intended to inform the UK Government’s “roadmap” for the recovery of Covid-19.

According to the UK Government’s ERP website, “The roadmap shows when and how events will return to safety in situations of high crowds, low social distances, or high risk of infection without mitigation. The plan to investigate is described.

One ERP event in Liverpool was an indoor nightclub that saw 3,000 to 4,000 local Liverpool participants over two nights. Participants had to take the Covid-19 test before admission, but did not have to wear masks or stay at a social distance during the event. Attendees were asked to take a second Covid-19 test after 5 days. Researchers tracked all positive cases and monitored the nearby community for an increase in Covid-19 cases. ..

According to the University of Liverpool, nine cases of Covid-19 related to a nightclub trial have been identified, but it is not entirely clear that the infection occurred at a concert. Pilot event. “

Professor Iain Buchan of the University of Liverpool Institute for Population Health told CNN that large indoor events should continue to require Covid-19 testing if crowd vaccination status is unknown.

“Large events, especially indoors without social distance or face cover, should be treated as a potential outbreak and all reasonable tests and other risk mitigation measures should be taken … Infection Liverpool events were run at a time of low background risk until the rates were low enough and various concerns arose. Testing is an important part of risk mitigation, “Buchan emailed CNN. Said in.

Erin Bromage, an associate professor of biology at the University of Massachusetts in Dartmouth, created a safety plan for Covid-19 for the Live Academy Awards and often consulted on how to safely conduct large-scale events. Agrees that testing is essential for the safety of large crowds gathering indoors while the virus is still present in the community.

“If this was an indoor live event, we would incorporate a quick antigen test, a cheap test that costs $ 5. I would incorporate them into the ticket price and get people to do it along the way.” Bromage said on the phone in an interview from a movie set where he was a Covid-19 consultant.

However, Bromage does not believe that the protocol was properly tested in a study in Barcelona or the United Kingdom. This is because we did not allow anyone who tested positive for the new coronavirus to attend the event.

“To actually test whether their behavior worked, we need to make sure that there were one or two infected people in the space and then no infections. Otherwise I don’t know if the protocol worked, “he told CNN.

Bromage believes that creating a quality indoor air environment by improving ventilation and reducing the risk of infection is a top priority for all indoor venues wishing to host large-scale live events. I will.

Bromage and the leaders of event studies in the UK and Barcelona all agree that the safety of large indoor concerts needs to be evaluated in the context of the expansion of the Covid-19 local community.

That’s exactly what Live Nation told CNN.

“For requirements, we follow guidance from local authorities, which of course depends on the region. We operate in more than 40 countries, so one size cannot cover all of them. The good news is that when the event resumes, we welcome everyone again. It’s a concert they know and love, “Live Nation emailed CNN.

For those who still find it a bit risky to attend a large music event, the pandemic gives them more access to the livestreaming concert experience so they can enjoy their favorite music. ..