Can Live Concerts/Events Return in 2021? Dr. Fauci Says Yes — Under Certain Circumstances

It hasn’t even been a year since live concerts, events, and public gatherings ground to a sudden halt due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but to some it feels like even longer. The entire live entertainment industry, like so many others, was hit uniquely hard by the pandemic. Tours of all sizes were cancelled (and continue to be scrapped), putting musicians, artists, venues, and the millions of those who work behind the scenes in serious personal and financial hardship.

We’re all pining for a time when we can resume attending live concerts, movie theaters, and related forms of entertainment — and in a virtual conference this past weekend, Dr. Anthony Fauci said he could foresee these sorts of venues being able to reopen “some time in the fall of 2021,” depending on the continued rollout of the coronavirus vaccine.

More, via the New York Times report:

At the conference, held by the Association of Performing Arts Professionals, Dr. Fauci sought to assure people in the industry that the end of their acute economic pain was in sight, while emphasizing that the timeline hinged on the country reaching an effective level of herd immunity, which he defined as vaccinating from 70 percent to 85 percent of the population.

“If everything goes right, this is will occur some time in the fall of 2021,” Dr. Fauci said, “so that by the time we get to the early to mid-fall, you can have people feeling safe performing onstage as well as people in the audience.”

Dr. Fauci also noted that requiring audience members to wear masks and facial coverings “could continue to be a norm for some time.”

This news comes after the Dec. 21 update that the new bipartisan coronavirus relief package allocated $15 billion of federal aid for live music venues hit hard by pandemic closures, incorporating the #SaveOurStages Act into its plan.

Even given these circumstances, the thought of being able to safely resume live music and other events at any point in the relatively near future would be a welcomed change from the “new normal” we’ve been forced to accept since March 2020. Now we’ll just see what happens next.