Pub time limit ‘will just spread virus’

RULES limiting how long people can stay in pubs will lead to ‘pub crawls’ ultimately spreading Covid-19 at a faster rate, according to one expert.

From tomorrow, Ireland will see pubs serving meals and restaurants reopening but with strict hygiene and social distancing rules imposed to help prevent the spread of the virus.

In the three weeks between phases three and four (July 20) of the Government’s reopening road map, customers will only be able to spend a maximum of 105 minutes at any one pub or restaurant.

They must be served a ‘substantial meal’ costing at least €9. An additional 15 minutes will be allocated during which people can leave, the tables can be sufficiently sanitised by staff and new customers can enter without mixing.

However, according to Professor Gerry Killeen, AXA Research Chair in Applied Pathogen Ecology at the School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences in UCC, the realities of these protocols will have unintended consequences.

‘There are parts of the reopening plan that just don’t make sense – the €9 meals, shifting people out of pubs after a designated time and getting someone else in to sit in the same chair, that’s going to turn into a shift system where people are moving around more than they would have normally,’ Prof. Killeen said. ‘It’ll turn into a pub crawl, where the virus could be spread faster.

‘For example, when we were reviewing procedures for getting people back into the labs in UCC, there’s a lot of pressure and few spaces but we still decided, let’s minimise the number of people using a space over the course of a day.

‘If that lab bench has time before the next person comes in that really reduces the risk, rather than give someone two hours here and two hours there, let’s give someone space in the lab for the day or half a day and then we minimise the throughput of people.

‘You’re not just transmitting when you’re there, you’re also contaminating the surfaces around you. It’s also unlikely people will be wearing masks because who wants to go for a pint with masks on.’

Prof. Killeen is concerned more people will be exposed with the 105-minute rule than without it, and that we are ‘steamrolling’ through the roadmap. ‘If we keep going the way we’re going, we will be back to mass public events in seven weeks, which is crazy,’ he said.