The Pauley Crowd Event Unmasked

Frame from video of Pauley crowd

Yesterday, we noted an incident in which a failure of appropriate crowd control on campus at Pauley Pavillion created a potentially dangerous situation.* There is another element concerning that crowd which you might have noticed if you played the video we included with that post.

When you view that video frame-by-frame, you will see the occasional mask in the crowd. But the vast majority of students are unmasked, as the sample frame from the video reproduced here shows.

What do UCLA guidelines say about masks in outdoor crowds? Here is the guidance:

Face masks: Outdoors

Face masks are no longer required to be worn outdoors, with certain exceptions associated with new COVID-19 cases and outbreaks on campus. However, in light of the recent spread of the delta variant, UCLA is recommending that individuals wear a mask outside, especially when outside in large groups in which physical distancing is not feasible.

Source: https://covid-19.ucla.edu/ucla-return-to-campus/.

Now, there is considerable uncertainty about the degree to which vaccinated individuals (which the vast majority of students are) can transmit the coronavirus. See, for example:

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2021/11/vaccinated-spread-the-coronavirus/620650/.

But we also know that the state authorities are becoming increasingly concerned about a winter surge:

https://apnews.com/article/coronavirus-pandemic-business-california-gavin-newsom-los-angeles-75c734f93147ad6cddfa55cf818eba3d.

Finally, we will note that the Pauley crowd situation is not the first time UCLA has organized an event in which its own guidelines for outdoor gatherings have been violated:

http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2021/09/somebody-thought-this-was-great-idea.html.

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*http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2021/11/crowds-without-controls-are-not-wise.html.

https://covid-19.ucla.edu/ucla-return-to-campus/