Eurovision 2021 was safe: Only 48 persons contracted Covid-19!

The Eurovision Song Contest 2021 was a safe event.  According to the first number only 48 out of 29875 visitors were infected with Coronavirus.  This means that roughly 0.16% of all attendees got Covid after the shows.

These are good news for the organizers given the ongoing circumstances.  For instance, these results mean that the number of cases was 1.6 persons per thousand in average.  The number is far lower than the national average in the Netherlands during the same week.  In this period there were around 4.9 cases per thousand in the host country.

The Eurovision Song Contest 2021 became a test to assess how to carry out with large events in the midst of a pandemic without causing an outbreak.  Accordingly, only a small audience of 3,500 persons could attend each show.  Further, the Eurovision Village took place online.  Measures against the spread of the coronavirus include asking everyone to show a negative Covid test every 48 hours in order to enter the Ahoy Arena.

Incidents

Notwithstanding the great efforts of the organizers, some negative incidents took place.  For instance, before the Turquoise carpet show one member of the Polish and the Icelandic delegation tested positive.  Both delegations could not attend the inauguration event.  Moreover, the Romanian and Maltese delegations missed the carpet event as a precautionary measure.  Apart from that, the Icelandic representatives could not perform live after one of their members tested positive.  One day later, the winner of the Eurovision Song Contest 2019, Duncan Laurence tested positive.  As a consequence, Duncan did not perform in the interval act as planned.

Thus, the first overall figures after the show looked more positive than initially thought.  However, these numbers do not include the crew, volunteers, press and delegation members who tested positive.  The organizers will publish the full statistics later this month.

How do you feel about these results?  Are you planning to attend Eurovision in 2022?

Source: Nu.nl