triple j have released results to a poll that shows 57% of people who responded said they would return to music festivals before a coronavirus vaccine was found.
1500 people were reportedly surveyed, with 881 people saying they would return before a vaccine was available, while 678 people said that they would not.
However, ABC‘s Health Editor, Dr. Norman Swan, said that a festival without a vaccine or some other treatment would be a high risk scenario.
“You are in close contact with other people and it only takes a few people to be infected for that to spread, and if you’ve got one super spreader in there, you’re stuffed,” Dr. Swan said on triple j this morning, speaking to host Lucy Smith.
“Social distancing at a music festival is impossible.”
Dr. Swan also said that the demographic of music festivals (ie. young adults) are actually the highest infection group of the virus in the country.
“…Particularly 22-29,” he said.
“That’s the group that don’t get symptoms and 50% of spread is asymptomatic.”
Swan was also asked about Splendour In The Grass and whether it would still go ahead in October as planned, to which he thought it was too early to predict.
What Swan is saying echoes the comments made by Australia’s Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Brendan Murphy, who essentially said festivals would be the last things to come back due to the lack of social distancing possible.
“Unless you’re absolutely, completely confident about your borders, your testing, your surveillance, you can’t relax a measure of distancing,” Murphy said.
“We certainly would not be contemplating large-scale gatherings. It’s hard for me to envisage reopening of nightclubs and big music festivals in the foreseeable future.”
