Holiday Pandemic

As the coronavirus pandemic grows worse than ever in the US, here is a summary of guidance on if and how to gather during the holidays:

CDC

Staying home is the safest option, avoiding the increased risk of spreading the coronavirus and COVID-19 to your relatives and yourself, but if you must take the risk and gather, consider..
- Community level: Check the number and rate of COVID-19 cases in the gathering location and where travelers may be coming from and through
- Location: Outdoor gatherings are less risky (and colder) than indoor
- Duration: Shorter gatherings are less risky (and less filling) than longer
- Number: Fewer people pose less risk (and less noise) than large groups
- Travel: Local trips are safer than distant travels, especially if people are traveling from multiple locations
- Behavior: Responsible people–who wear masks, maintain social distance, and wash hands–pose much less risk than irresponsible people who refuse these basic preventative measures
People should NOT gather if they…
- Have symptoms of COVID-19 or the disease itself
- Are still awaiting results of COVID-19 tests
- May have been exposed to someone with COVID-19 in the previous 2 weeks
- Are at increased risk of severe illness or death from COVID-19
CDC also provides guidance for hosts, travelers and revelers

Staying home is the safest option, given there is no perfectly safe way to gather, but a difficult choice for many families, so…
Talk to relatives openly ASAP about how you plan to protect them, your immediate family and yourself
- Don’t feel pressured into taking uncomfortable or even dangerous risks
- Don’t judge those who opt out this year
People not in the same household (or larger “pod”) pose the same risk to each other as strangers, so maintain social distance and wear masks as you would in public
Testing everyone in advance helps mitigate risk, assuming all results are negative, but is not a guarantee, since people may become infected anytime after the test sample was taken, or may get a false negative result (25% of the time with some tests) and still be infectious (this may be the case in some of the White House’s super-spreader events)
Eating together increases risk, since people remove masks and spread droplets and vapor by breathing, talking, coughing, sneezing

Holiday parties potentially spread infections, even if small and only with relatives, as evidenced by infections traced to weddings, funerals, religious gatherings and other everyday group events
CDC advice may be mocked by some who feel it infringes upon their “freedom” (to infect?), at their relatives’ and their own peril
There is no ideal choice between risks (loss of health and life) vs isolation (loss of in-person camaraderie and rituals this holiday season)
Test types: Antigen tests are usually quicker (and sometimes cheaper) but less accurate than “gold standard” PCR tests.
- My wife and I just took a PCR test with saliva samples that claims 90% accuracy but takes 36 hours for results.
- The same clinic offers an antigen test that provides results within 15 minutes but with only 75% accuracy (1 in 4 chance of false negative).