Liverpool Pilot Events Have No Impact On Covid Spread In The Region

The US$1.5 Billion Expansion Of The Jacob K. Javits Convention Center Completed

The US$1.5 billion expansion of the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center has been completed, as Governor Andrew M. Cuomo announced on May 11, 2021. The massive project, which adds 1.2 million square feet of total event-related space on Manhattan's West Side, was completed on budget despite the challenges related to COVID-19.

The Javits Center is one of busiest convention centers in the United States. Governor Andrew M. Cuomo said: "Today we're announcing the completion of the new expanded Javits Center, which is going to be an economic engine for years to come. It is a 1.2 million square foot expansion. It goes from 2.1 million square feet to 3.3 million square feet, a 50% increase. And it's remodified for the needs of today.

Now it has 200,000 square feet of meeting room space, exhibit hall space, a 54,000 square foot ballroom, glass enclosed rooftop, a new glass atrium."

Speaking about the traffic situation, he adds: "We built a four-level, 27 loading dock marshalling facility that will take all the trucks that are coming to the convention centre, puts them in an indoor facility, more than 20,000 eventrelated needed trucks off the street annually."

Liverpool Public Health officials and scientists have found the city ’ s pilot events did not cause any detectable spread of Covid-19 across the region.The city hosted four hugely successful events as part of the national Events Research Programme (ERP), with a total of 13,258 people attending The Good Business Festival, two nightclub events hosted by Circus and the Sefton Park Pilot music festival.All attendees were required to take a lateral flow test ahead of the event – a negative test would allow them access.

Five people with the Covid-19 virus were identified through this process and were not allowed to attend.Ticketholders were encouraged to take a PCR test on the day of the event, and a second one five days later.This process identified four people as possibly having the virus at an event; and a further seven people were identified with the virus four to seven days after they attended an event. Of those who tested positive – two attended the music festival, nine attended the nightclub and none attended the business festival. Many of the cases were friends who meet outside of events and may not have been infected at an event itself.Everyone who tested positive was successfully followed up by the contact tracing team. Scientists found the testing, data and contact tracing systems worked well, with key information being available to public health teams before the events which allowed contacts of potential cases to be traced quickly.

The research team also found that between 25 per cent and 43 per cent of people returned a PCR test after the event, with the Sefton Park Pilot festival seeing three times the number of the other Liverpool pilots due to the incentive of winning tickets to future gigs. Every Covid-19 test result for the 2.6m population of Cheshire and Merseyside was examined before and after the events, with 96 per cent of tickets linked to test results. The results showed there was no evidence of any substantial spread of the virus around the pilot events.Covid-19 infections remain low in Liverpool and the pattern of variants is being watched carefully.The public health and science teams are cautiously optimistic that events can reopen reasonably safely with effective testing in place, and anyone feeling unwell should not attend.Wearing face coverings or maintaining social distancing were not required at any of Liverpool’ s pilot events.

Liverpool’s test events were:

Ÿ Wednesday 28 April – The Good Business Festival

Ÿ Friday 30 April – Circus nightclub

Ÿ Saturday 1 May – Circus nightclub

Ÿ Sunday 2 May – Sefton Park Pilot music festival