Outdoors versus indoors: How to minimize your risk for COVID-19
Some venues are much more dangerous in terms of getting COVID-19 than others.
The News & Observer talked to Pia MacDonald, senior director of applied public health research at RTI International, about what factors affect the likelihood of spreading COVID-19 and how to stay safe in a high-risk area.
Indoors is riskier
It has been reported that the chances of contracting COVID-19 outdoors are much lower than they are indoors. MacDonald said that whether this is true specifically for the delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, is unclear, but “generally speaking, it’s much more risky to congregate in an indoor environment than it is in an outdoor environment.”
MacDonald said it’s important to be able to keep physical distance between people and have as much air exchange as possible.
“So it really comes down to thinking through how close we’re going to be to other people, but also how much air exchange there is going to be, so that if there are virus particles circulating in the air, that air does not get stale and linger and the concentration of virus particles doesn’t keep increasing,” MacDonald said.
Indoor spaces with a lot of people moving in and out and poor air ventilation can be dangerous in terms of contracting COVID-19.
Other experts agree with MacDonald. Dr. Cameron Wolfe, an infectious disease specialist at Duke Health, said in a recent press conference that being outdoors is “generally a lower risk” than being indoors. He added that proximity and ventilation matter for both COVID-19 in general and the delta variant specifically.
The delta variant in particular is much more transmissible than the ancestral coronavirus strain, MacDonald said. It can be transferred from one person to upwards of five to 10 people, she said — numbers one would see with chickenpox. People would pass the ancestral coronavirus strain on to around one to three people.
Does it matter what activity I’m doing?
Wolfe noted that risk depends on the event, both outdoors and indoors. Playing soccer outside presents a lower risk than going to an outdoor concert or another event where you are close to other people for long periods of time. Sitting at a bar among 10 or more other people is much riskier than sitting in a socially distanced indoor environment.
Who is it safest to be around?
MacDonald said “everything is patchy in terms of where [COVID-19] transmission is increasing quickly.” Vaccination and transmission rates vary from state to state, and from county to county.
When congregating with a group of people, MacDonald said, “It’s really important to understand where each of the individuals are coming from — both their geography and their social network — and what’s happening in those at that time.”
How can I make my space more safe?
MacDonald said simple measures to improve air flow — such as leaving doors and windows open and running a fan — as well as making sure people don’t congregate too closely together can help make areas more safe.
If you’re indoors, wearing a mask and physically distancing from others can also reduce the risk of getting sick. It’s still important to wash your hands and try to not touch your face, especially in public, MacDonald said.
Getting vaccinated can help protect people from getting COVID-19, MacDonald said. With the delta variant becoming dominant, MacDonald said “we probably need to make some changes moving forward” to establish protection.
“We’re at this dangerous inflection point in the pandemic, but we have measures and ways to protect ourselves and our communities, and the base layer is really vaccination,” she said.
She noted that the delta variant can take advantage of people who have never been exposed to it, either through vaccination or previously being infected — and that transmission rates among those people “are going to go up very quickly.”
This story was originally published August 6, 2021 at 6:04 PM with the headline "Outdoors versus indoors: How to minimize your risk for COVID-19."