Salem To Require Coronavirus Tests For 100+ Indoor October Events

SALEM, MA — Anyone attending an indoor event with 100 or more people at a venue open to the public in Salem during the month of October will need a negative coronavirus test within 72 hours of the event regardless of vaccination status.

The Salem Board of Health voted unanimously to adopt what appears to be the first-of-its-kind requirement in the country in the response to an increase in breakthrough infections in the region and the fear that large indoor Halloween crowds of out-of-state visitors could lead to a "super-spreader event" in the city.

The mandate takes effect at midnight on Oct. 1 and expires on Nov. 1 if there is no further action from the Board. The testing requirement applies to all events — including private receptions, weddings and other parties — that take place at indoor venues open to the public, such as hotel ballrooms and function halls.

"This is coming from a place from us, as a community, that is going to experience something unique in the city," said Board of Health Chair Dr. Jeremy Schiller before the vote, "which is well over 100,000 — hundreds of thousands of people — coming to our city in the next six weeks."

Some of the Halloween balls planned for hotels and other indoor spaces in the city during October could include up to 1,000 attendees.

While several event coordinators and venue managers said during the public comment portion of the meeting that the test mandate will be unduly burdensome, logistically nightmarish and practically unnecessary based on recent infection rates in the city and region, Mayor Kim Driscoll was one of the few who spoke in public comment in favor of the measure.

"The key here is not to lead to a situation where we are all regretting the fact that we had these large-scale events because it led to a number of people in our community coming down with COVID, or worse yet, a super-spreader event that affects people even further beyond our borders," Driscoll said.

Driscoll noted that 50 percent of Salem residents ages 17 to 29 remain unvaccinated and some of those residents could be ones working the events.

Board members decided to expand the test window from 24 hours to 72 hours in an effort to allow those from out of town attending events in Salem to be tested prior to arrival. Health Agent David Greenbaum said the city is working with Curative — the company that ran the mass vaccination site at the Danvers DoubleTree Hotel — to provide additional opportunities for rapid tests in the downtown area during October.

Greenbaum said those rapid tests are about 75 percent accurate.

In a virtual meeting with businesses on Monday, both Driscoll and Greenbaum said they did not envision additional restrictions forthcoming beyond the indoor mask mandate that was enacted on Aug. 23 and set to expire on Nov. 13.

Greenbaum said Friday night that he does not consider the new test requirement a contradiction to that.

"I don't really view this as a restriction personally," he said. "I think a restriction, to me, would be telling folks 'the balls are going to be canceled' would be a restriction. This is a mitigation effort."

The new test requirement would not apply to businesses such as large restaurants and theaters that may have more than 100 people indoors at any one time, Greenbaum argued, because people at those locations tend to stay with their own groups and are not walking around eating and drinking with their masks down throughout a night.

Several event organizers said they felt left out of the process of adding another requirement — whether it be a restriction or a mitigation effort — that is now being forced on them within weeks of major events, and that it was a "breach of trust" from the city after they were led to believe that no further coronavirus-related measures were being considered.

"I think we're adding an unnecessary element to Halloween and October in Salem in general," Salem Creative Collective President John Andrews said. "I don't think mitigation is bad. I would love to say that this is going to work. I would absolutely love to say that this is going to work.

"I don't see this (not) ending up in some serious, serious problems and have serious concerns. ... This is tension out there already and this is adding a level of tension that I just don't think we understand right now.."

"This is not easy," Schiller concluded after the vote. "This is the best we can do."

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(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at Scott.Souza@Patch.com. Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)

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