In a reversal of its previous policy, the Coachella music festival will not require Covid-19 vaccination, testing or masking when it resumes this April in southern California, the organizers said.
The hugely popular festival saw up to 125,000 attendees leading up to the start of pandemic, during which it was cancelled three times.
On Tuesday, Coachella and its sister festival, Stagecoach, due to take place the following week, announced the lifted restrictions on their websites.
“As we prepare to spend an incredible weekend in the desert together we are announcing that there will be no vaccination, testing or masking requirements at Stagecoach 2022, in accordance with local guidelines,” the festival organizer said on its Twitter account.
Similarly, Coachella updated the health and safety section of its website, and added: “There is no guarantee, express or implied, that those attending the festival will not be exposed to Covid-19”.
It emphasized that Covid-19 is “an extremely contagious disease” and went on to recommend face coverings for concert-goers – though claiming it was doing so to help them protect themselves against desert dust.
Both festivals are run by Goldenvoice, a division of the international concert organizer AEG Live, and are held at the Empire Polo Club in Indio, California, within weeks of each other.
California’s department of public health strongly recommends that outdoor mega-events, such as music festivals or marathons, require attendees to show proof of vaccination or a negative Covid-19 test.
It also asks attendees to “consider better fit and filtration for masks”, and recommends more effective alternatives to cloth masks, including N95, KN95 and KF94 surgical masks.
Some on Twitter condemned the decision. One responded to Stagecoach’s tweet: “Celebrate the death of a few hundred thousand? You are amazing people.”
Another wrote: “In other words, Coachella is setting up a superspreader event. Awesome.”
“It will be renamed Covidchella,” another joked.
The decision marks a reversal of policy. Last October, the festivals’ organizers said they would require attendees to show proof of Covid-19 vaccination or a negative test.
This year’s incarnation of Coachella, which is scheduled to run on the weekends of 15-17 and 22-24 April , will be headlined by Harry Styles, Billie Eilish and Ye, while Thomas Rhett, Carrie Underwood and Luke Combs will headline Stagecoach, which runs from 29 April to 1 May.
Last summer the Chicago-based musical festival Lollapalooza operated at full capacity, ushering in more than 400,000 concertgoers who were required to show either vaccination proof or a negative Covid-19 test.
Lollapalooza organizers subsequently released data that it claimed showed infection rates were low among attendees, and declared that the festival was not a “super-spreader event”.
This year, Lollapalooza organizers have said that “preventative health measures (eg proof of negative Covid-19 test or full Covid-19 vaccination, masks) may be required for this show.”
Currently, most major music festivals scheduled in the US for later in the year, including the Miami-based Ultra and New York’s Governors Ball, are requiring all ticket holders to be vaccinated or show a negative Covid-19 test.
