Posted on 08/08/20
| News Source: NY Times
Jo Ellen Chism, 57, a retiree who lives in The Woodlands, Texas, about an hour outside Houston, was nervous about attending her stepson’s wedding on June 20.
“They were going to postpone it, but then the Catholic church decided they would open and would have up to 75 people,” she said. “75 people seemed like a pretty big gathering to me during this Covid time.”
She went to support her family. She was inside the church for an hourlong service that included a processional and communion. At the reception, at Haak Winery, she sat indoors at a round table with other guests, some of whom were from out of town. While everyone started the day in masks, they took them off for photos and never replaced them.
Her symptoms started four days later. With a runny nose, sore throat and bad headache, it could have been a sinus infection. Two days later she tested positive for Covid-19 along with 12 other guests, including her 10-year-old grandson and the groom’s 76-year-old grandfather. He is still recovering after a trip to the emergency room with double pneumonia. She said 13 additional guests had symptoms but didn’t get tested.
Ms. Chism’s oldest son kept track of all the sick guests through the seating chart, on which he marked who was positive, negative and untested. Still, like most super-spreader events, without sophisticated contact tracing, it’s impossible to identify patient zero.
“I could just kick myself because I probably shouldn’t have gone to that wedding,” she said. “I am really thankful I was not terribly ill.” (She missed the birth of two grandchildren because of her need to isolate.)
After a brief pause, wedding season is back in full swing across the country. Couples are working within the confines of state laws to carry out their nuptials during the pandemic. But despite precautions coronavirus has swept into many of these events, both large and small, infecting guests and vendors. Read more at NY Times