UK: Brits going to poorly ventilated pubs rather than big venues

Tuesday, October 26, 2021

The UK vaccine passports could fuel COVID-19 spread by encouraging punters to visit poorly ventilated pubs rather than big venues

Now the vaccine passports could send COVID-19 cases spiking by sending Brits into badly ventilated pubs from larger venues, the Government fears.

Now the event organisers would have to hire thousands of security staff to check Covid certificates as well as see takings hit by a fall in the number of punters to venues where documentation is required like sport arenas, a leaked report suggests.

The findings are included in analysis marked “official secret” by the Department of Digital, Culture, Media and Sport.

It asked if vaccine passports could have any displacement effects to other types of venues not included for certification. It warned that football fans turned away from stadiums for not having a COVID-19 pass could help fuel the virus by piling into packed pubs to watch games.

The document reads that there is a potential displacement between live events venues and hospitality venues.

A core concern in the sector is that certification could displace activity and business away from music venues to, say, pubs with music and late alcohol licences, etc. which could be counterintuitive and potentially counter-productive.

It went on to say that if certification displaces some fans from structured and well-ventilated sports stadia, this could lead to them attending unstructured and poorly ventilated pubs instead, where they will have access to more alcohol than if there were in the stadia.

The evidence from the Euros showed spikes in cases associated with pubs even when England were playing abroad.

The impact assessment said 5,700 stewards would have to be hired at big stadiums so fans could get their COVID-19 certification checked.

It could lead to “bottlenecks” at Premier League games with venues affected suffering a hit of between £345 million and £2.067 billion.

The document says around six million checks would have been needed if the scheme was brought in this month.

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