Scientists change their tune and disown Covid choir ban

THE ban imposed on choirs during the pandemic was based on flawed evidence, scientists have concluded after finding that an outbreak at a church in America early in the crisis was not caused by a superspreader.

On March 10 2020, a rehearsal of the Skagit Valley Chorale in Mount Vernon, Washington, led to 52 of the 61 attendees being infected with coronavirus, and two deaths. An investigation by

Skagit County public health officials laid the blame on a single chorister who turned up with symptoms and later tested positive for the virus.

Its findings were cited by countries that banned choirs and church gatherings on the grounds that indoor singing could spread the virus. The paper was quoted in 772 papers and downloaded or viewed 618,000 times.

But a review of the case by Nottingham Trent University, Brunel University and the Brighton and Sussex

Medical School, concluded that many of the choristers’ symptoms started too early to have been caused by the rehearsal. It appears the majority of people had been infected two to four days beforehand and that coronavirus was rife in the community.

Prof Robert Dingwall, of Nottingham Trent University, one of the review’s authors, said: “There have been a lot of papers saying that choirs are dangerous, and citing this paper, without actually questioning the findings. It was one of the first reports so it was very influential. But we looked at it and thought the speed with which people were getting infected and displaying symptoms was not very plausible. It didn’t fit the epidemic curve.

“This was a building designed for 120, with quite a high ceiling and doors opening and constant air movement, it doesn’t make sense to imagine that there are these clouds of aerosols drifting around and being inhaled. It is plausible there are risks in packed indoor spaces, but the risks of ordinary supermarkets, shops or church gatherings have probably been exaggerated.”

Although evidence emerged questioning airborne spread in well ventilated buildings, the incident was used to back indoor restrictions.

Prof Dingwall added: “Even in human challenge trials, where people have had the virus shoved up their noses, only about half get infected.”

Achoir practice in March 2020 in the Skagit Valley in Washington State was called by the media, even a year or more later, “one of the first and most famous superspreader events”. But now scientists have found that most who fell sick with Covid after the event would have done so if they had not attended.

To blame singing was a disastrous error, affecting choirs and hymn-singing all round the world. Singers who had benefited from exercise and communal activity were banished to inert isolation. Even when the law in Britain allowed people back in church they were banned from singing.

Then absurd measures were imposed to counter a threat never present, such as installing giant vacuum cleaners to suck air away from an area where a choir was operating. Skagit was really an early symptom of lockdown lunacy.