Festival season and concerts have hit another wall. California Governor Gavin Newsom believes concerts won’t return till 2021. Although we thought this was just an afterthought originally, it is looking more and more likely to be our reality.
During a press conference, Newsom stated mass gatherings would be “negligible at best.” It makes complete sense for the population to be majority immune before we shove thousands of people into a confined place. Although it causes anguish, it looks like Coachella and EDC are at a big risk of being canceled. This was the Governor’s full thoughts:
“So large-scale events that bring in hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of strangers, all together across every conceivable difference, health and otherwise, is not in the cards based upon our current guidelines and current expectations.”
Public health expert Zeke Emanuel was the first to suggest that concerts would be the last thing to come back. He believes it won’t return till Fall 2021 at the earliest. While I think most of us believe this is an outlandish thought, it is in the realm of possibilities. He fervently believes festival season will not occur this fall. But that won’t stop us from hoping it does.
The Vaccine
Unless we get a major breakthrough, a Coronavirus vaccine is not expected until Spring 2021. Because of this, we may see a concert-less 2020. Truly sad but for the sake of humanity, a requirement. The mayors of Los Angeles and New York have agreed with these statements. They all are on the same page that public gatherings are the last thing that will return once real-life resumes. New York Mayor Bill DiBlasio said:
“I want to get people back to work, of course. I want to get kids back to school. But I think it will take months to go through that whole sequence. And the last thing I want to do is gather 10,000, 20,000, 50,000 people in one place. That’s like the exact opposite of social distancing.”