As outdoor dining grows, is it still safe?
Disease specialists say open air remains better
Columbus last week extended an outdoor dining program that lets dozens of restaurants open more patio space to meet unusually high demand for outside seating.
At the onset of the coronavirus pandemic in the spring and summer of 2020, epidemiologists and researchers said it was safer to be outside than in, and restaurant patrons heeded their advice by demanding patio seating.
New and more infectious variants of coronavirus have since emerged, filling hospital beds and extending the pandemic just as the end seemed to be in sight.
But have those novel strains changed the medical community’s recommendation on outdoor dining?
The answer, according to infectious disease specialists, is a resounding “no.”
Is it considered safe to dine on a patio? Yes, and here’s why
While the variants are more infectious, the newer versions travel through the air in the same manner as the original version, experts say.
“I interpret the CDC’S current considerations for restaurants and bars in the COVID-19 variant era along the lines of the old adage, ‘The more things change the more they stay the same,’” said Dr. Mark Cameron, an epidemiologist for Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland.
If anything has changed, it’s the emergence of highly effective COVID vaccines, experts said. Vaccination, doctors stress, is the surest way to protect yourself.
In response to heightened demand for outdoor seating, cities throughout Ohio let taverns, diners and pubs expand their patios into parking lots, sidewalks and on-street parking spaces.
Columbus was a bit of a laggard, waiting until August 2020 to smooth the application process for expanded patio space with an outdoor dining pilot program. The city extended the program twice, most recently through
mid-november.
Coronavirus floats through the air on tiny droplets called aerosols, which are more likely to infect someone when they cluster in the air, said Dr. Iahn Gonsenhauser, chief quality and patient officer at the Wexner Medical Center
Clusters of aerosols dissipate faster outdoors because the airflow and lack of walls give them plenty of places to go, said Dr. Mark Herbert, an infectious disease specialist for the Mount Carmel Medical Group.
“One of the things we worry about inside is that the air is stagnant,” he said.
In other words, the particles carrying the virus are trapped in place. A handful of Greater Columbus restaurants upgraded their ventilation to improve airflow, a move infectious disease experts supported as long as those restaurants pledged to keep using other mitigation strategies like physical distancing.
For vaccinated individuals, “dining outdoors will still decrease the risk of transmission from an already low probability,” Gonsenhauser said. “For the unvaccinated individual, all of the same recommendations about dining outdoors versus indoors would remain.”
The relative safety of outside spaces versus indoor spaces is difficult to quantify, experts say, but research has conclusively shown that clusters of droplets carrying the virus disappear faster outdoors, Cameron said.
A study conducted in Japan in the summer of 2020 pooled infection data from a variety of indoor and outdoor events, and found the odds of transmission from indoor activities is nearly 20 times higher.
However, “everything related to COVID is full of caveats,” cautioned Joe Gastaldo, an infectious disease doctor for the Ohiohealth hospital system. “Caveat No. 1, is if you cannot physically distance.”
So-called superspreader events have been identified at outdoor gatherings, including a function at the White House Rose Garden in the waning months of the Trump Administration.
The odds of infection greatly increase when people are piled on top of each other, Gastaldo said.
Tents and other outdoor structures, he added, must have at least two sides open to allow air to flow freely.
Masks still offer another layer or protection and vaccination remains the best way to stay safe, Gastaldo said. pcooley@dispatch.com @Patrickacooley