Catering or festival visits have resulted in 62 large clusters with twenty or more infections per cluster in the past two weeks. That’s in an overview of the RIVM that the Ministry of Health has released. Almost exclusively 18 to 25-year-olds were infected.
Most large clusters originated in the catering industry, with one cluster with 152 infections. This probably concerns the Aspen Valley disco in Enschede. Ten clusters were also found in student associations with a maximum of 57 infections per cluster.
Seven clusters have been linked by source and contact researchers to festivals that have taken place since the relaxation of June 26. More than 1,600 people have been infected. “Numbers per cluster are still increasing daily,” RIVM writes.
It concerns these festivals:
- Verknipt festival (Utrecht): 20,000 visitors, 900 infected
- Shift work festival (Breda): 20,000 visitors, 423 infected
- Chin Chin Festival (Amsterdam): 10,000 visitors, 118 infected
- Fair (Heiloo): hundreds of visitors, 102 infected
- Stereo Sunday festival (Venlo): 20,000 visitors, 93 infected
- Summer Festival (Denekamp): 1600 visitors, 20 infected
- Theater Amsterdam: 150 visitors, 58 infected
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The overview states that five festivals had to work with Testing for Access because of the visitor numbers, so that visitors did not have to stick to the 1.5 meter distance.
One of the festivals, Ploegendienst in Breda with 20,000 visitors, has not properly complied with the rules according to the RIVM. “QR codes were hardly checked, no ID check was done either. People were pushed in at a rapid pace,” the overview says. It has resulted in 423 infections so far.
Things also went wrong at a village fair in Heiloo with hundreds of visitors. Tests for access were used, “but people have also climbed the fences”. There have been 102 infections linked to the fair so far.
tents
Five of the seven festivals were in tents. “Reasonably low and exteriors closed”, the RIVM notes about a festival in Amsterdam. “Pair of roofs, packed closely underneath”, it says over the tents at a festival in Breda.
The Verknipt festival in Utrecht with 20,000 visitors has been further investigated. The number of infections there now stands at 900. The RIVM writes that no advice was given in advance about the ventilation of the tents.
It may not stop at these seven festivals. Between June 26 and July 10, eight other major events of which no clusters are known were held. Those may still follow, RIVM writes.
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