Well, that was a bad idea

[liv]

We (jack and I) got Covid at Worldcon, or possibly travelling back from it.

So yes, purplecthulhu and others, you were right, it was a bad risk. There's no point second guessing what points I could have chosen a different balance between masking and eating. Lots of people I know who are as scrupulous or more so about masking also caught plague. It's pretty clear anecdotally and from what little data we have that population levels are really high right now, and mixing over 7000 people from all over the world in a mostly enclosed space for 5 days was never going to give good odds.

On the whole it was a good con. Very well organized, I'm sure there's going to be some scandal coming out but it looked to me like they did most things right and avoided many of the pitfalls of other cons. The programming was generally really good; I didn't go to a single bad panel or talk. The worst experience I had, and this was a bit of a theme, was three really interesting and knowledgeable experts being talked over by one white male blowhard who wrote a book on a vaguely related subject. Generally the moderators were pretty good at keeping a lid on this sort of thing, but almost every good panel I went to would have been even better if that one white guy hadn't been there. (To be clear, different white guys in every case.) That is still a massive improvement on previous experiences where three random mediocre white men completely drowning out the one interesting panellist is more typical.

Events were well matched to room sizes. Not perfectly, but perfection is impossible. And the whole venue had a very very strict policy that you don't overfill rooms; I was impressed that the whole volunteer team backed up the employees in enforcing this, no 'just this once' exceptions for famous or pushy people, so they completely avoided any kind of asshole filter issues. Queues were not excessively long, and there seemed to be at least some provision for people who can't stand in queues. The con also successfully enforced bans against people who have been jerks at past cons, even the kind of jerks who booked into a nearby hotel and tried to turn up anyway. They didn't allow extremely famous authors to be divas, but insisted that everybody follow policy, which has the pleasing result that the con wasn't at all dominated by a few big names but instead there was a really good range of interesting people from all backgrounds.

The main hall and dealers' room were just great, really spacious with a whole range of interesting exhibits. There were plenty of food options even within the actual con space, and a street of very nice small local eateries half a mile away. The ceremonies were well organized and entertaining and didn't drag on. They fixed the Hugo awards (yes, technically a separate organization from the con itself but very much part of the experience) and came up with something transparent and fair. My only real complaint was that most of the dances and ceilidhs took place in rooms too small for dancing, so I ended up not really joining in any of those.

In terms of content and organization that was the best con I've been to. In terms of social, it wasn't perfect but I did get to meet or meet up with several of the people I was most excited to see, rosefox and partner, sfred and djm4, khalinche, and even briefly met kiya though we didn't get to talk much. And I hung out with lots of my Cambridge friends but not like at some cons where I've accidentally ended up travelling hundreds of miles to spend time with my local neighbours exclusively. Lobbycon kind of didn't work for me; between trying to stay masked, and the organization of programme being ironically too good (in that people spent the time between items purposefully travelling to the next thing, not stuck in queues or clustering in pinch points), I didn't get to just hang out in random spots and have chance conversations with random cool people.

And yet, I regretted going basically from the moment I arrived. I spent a lot of time fretting about how expensive it was in money, but mostly worrying about catching Covid, which in fact turned out to be founded. Even though it was good it wasn't worth the risk. I thought the Covid policy was sound (caring about ventilation, masks 'strongly recommended', everybody tests before arrival and then daily). But in fact the only part of it enforced was the 'don't hassle other people for their different approach to infection risk', and that was interpreted to mean, don't mention the plague at all. I understand that the con don't have the power to literally force people to mask and test, and some people actively can't. But they didn't communicate the policy in any way, just expected people to read the small print of the Ts&Cs, and in fact they prohibited participants from referring to the policy under the 'don't hassle other people' clause. Even ventilation was good in the main site, but terrible in the attached hotel where some of the programming took place.

Following the policy (which nobody else seemed to even know about, even people who are generally covid cautious), I tested every day and did not show positive until this morning. jack was symptomatic on Tuesday and positive yesterday. I had very mild symptoms which could be anything yesterday, (scratchy throat, a bit sniffly) and a very faint line on the test today. So given the timing it's possible that jack caught it right at the end of the con, and I caught it from him travelling home together on the sleeper train, when we didn't mask. And it's possible that even if I hadn't gone I would have caught plague from jack anyway; we tried isolating from each other when he was positive and I wasn't yet, but I think it was too late by then.

The only thing that makes this slightly less bad is that I very unusually have no commitments at all for the next two weeks, so my life isn't going to be very disrupted by needing to quarantine. (Yes, I know it's not legally required, I'm doing it because it's ethical.) So if I just get an acute case with no medium- or long-term consequences, I'll be fine to go back to college for the start of term.

So, all in all, good, but not worth risking my life and livelihood :-( I won't do that again, even if my entire family are going and I want to be with them.

Comments

[emperor]

I don't know how the con organisers ended up with the "let's have a sensible Covid policy on paper, but then not tell anyone about it nor do anything to attempt to enforce it" plan, but it was Not A Good Idea :(

I hope you and J are better soon!

[purplecthulhu]

Knowing some of the people involved, and the internal disputes in fandom about what constitutes safe covid practice, I'm not surprised. I suspect the policy changes were brought in at the insistence of those who are more careful, but the implementation of the policy and the 'don't tell anyone at the con about it' approach was from those who were less cautious and did not want to make people feel uncomfortable. Sadly the result of that is what we see now.

[emperor]

That sounds very plausible. I think, alas, it ends up being worse than having a "we are post-Covid, wear a mask if you want to" policy, since some folk will have felt it was going to be a Covid-safer space (based on what the policy said) than it turned out to be.

[purplecthulhu]

Indeed. It would have been more honest to say 'we're ignoring covid, come at your own risk' than trying to pretend this wasn't in fact what they were doing.

[liv]

Yeah, I definitely wouldn't have gone had there not been an airborne relevant and generally reasonable Covid policy in place. I knew I was taking a risk even with a broadly-good policy, but I expected the policy to be more than completely theoretical. I mean, I didn't expect 100% compliance because some people genuinely can't mask and some people actively like catching and spreading Covid. And of course nobody could have known in advance that we'd be near the peak of a huge wave, but you have to make policy assuming that could be the case, given we have consistently 4-5 waves a year these days.

[jack]

My impression in retrospect is that they set out to write a policy which be acceptable to the most people, but that only half of it was a policy they had, in the sense of something they expected to be followed.

I think the de facto policy was approx "no-one is prevented from taking any precautions, known infectious people are strongly encouraged not to wander about, and people are very very gently nudged to consider precautions" which is about as good a policy as I ever expect to see. But I think it's a problem that they said there was a really quite decent policy of encouraging tests and masking that they presumably had no intention of following (even though I expect everywhere to treat policies like that to be polite fiction :( ).

[purplecthulhu]

Very sorry to hear this!

Do you and J have what you need to keep safe and well while isolating?

It's worth remembering to rest up extra long after even a mild bout of covid to keep long covid at bay.

Good luck for a full and fast recovery!

[liv]

Thank you. And I'm glad you stayed away and gave me good advice even though I didn't take it. I am basically planning to do nothing for two weeks, and these days getting stuff delivered is pretty easy. I'm in a pretty unusual position in that I can afford to stay home until I'm completely recovered, but most people are not mature students in the middle of the long summer vacation, with decent savings and no pressing care responsibilities.

[ambyr]

I'm sorry you're sick! It's so hard to balance risk vs reward.

I have a lot of thoughts about Worldcon 2024's COVID policies after managing COVID response at Worldcon 2021, and I'm afraid most of them (especially the ones I'm willing to express in public) come down to, "I'm so relieved it's not my problem any more."

[liv]

I forgot you had personal experience of being in charge of Covid at a Worldcon! I really think 2024's policies were pretty decent, they just didn't actually apply them. I mean, not only not enforce, which is undoubtedly challenging, but actively undermining attempts to inform anyone that the policies even existed. I am very very willing to give the benefit of the doubt, being in charge of this sort of thing is genuinely hard.

[wychwood]

Oh no! I'm glad you enjoyed the panels etc, at least. And I hope it will be mild and easily-recovered-from.

[ursula]

Awww, I'm sorry! (And sorry to have missed you at the con, I did not do a good job of finding dw people.)

I am still testing negative but am skipping visiting the friend I hoped to see after the con as she is highly vulnerable :(

[liv]

I also didn't do great at finding people, I had completely missed that you were over for the con. Sorry to have missed you too, I hope you had a good time and continue plague-free. I am sure you're right to stay away from your friend. I cancelled an in person talk yesterday though I wasn't positive yet, because I correctly inferred that I was probably already infectious.

[seekingferret]

I'm sorry you're sick and hope it's not too bad.

[liv]

Based on last time I expect to be really miserable for a few days but then recover. Obviously one can't be sure, it's a bit of a cursed roulette, but I'm not too worried now I know I'm infected.

I did manage to find the Eicha reading though, thanks for pointing me in the right direction.

[princessofgeeks]

Thank you for the update and I'm sorry you are sick!

[syderia]

Add me to the people who didn't know about the policy... (Although my friend and I were masking all the time inside except when drinking or eating because that's polite.)
I hope you and Jack don't suffer too much and get better quickly.

[liv]

Yeah, that's what I found really depressing. People who generally mask out of politeness or personal caution didn't know that there was a policy 'strongly recommending' masks, let alone people who only mask if they're asked to. And it's not a recommendation if you don't actually communicate it to anyone. I hope you also had a good con experience.

[sfred]

I'm so sorry you and Jack got sick.

It was really lovely to see you and spend time with you. I hope we can do so again in less risky circumstances.

[liv]

Seeing you was a real highlight for me! And I think we mostly interacted outdoors and I'd be very surprised if my exposure was during outdoor conversations with cautious people.

[sfred]

Yes, I agree - I meant the overall circumstances of a gathering of 7000 or so people.

Seeing you was a real highlight for me too!

[redbird]

I'm sorry to hear that, and I hope it goes as well as possible for you and Jack from here.

[ursamajor]

Well, rats. :( I hope you and J feel better soon!

[aldabra]

Damn, that's a shame. I've been quietly envious of the people who had the get-up-and-go to have gone, but I don't envy the plague risk. (And OTOH we're planning to fly to California because my mum is 87, and I Do Not Want to be locked in a metal tube with all those other people for twelve hours, especially not twice, but I'm not allowed to mask at work and I'm obviously going to get it eventually anyway and there are only so many years.)

It is so so hard to keep not doing the things when everything looks just like it used to look.

[liv]

What, seriously? Why on earth are you not allowed to mask at work when you're not even public facing?! That's really awful, and I'm sorry your working conditions are so awful.

And yeah, eventually my motivations for international travel are going to be stronger than my motivations to avoid being in the metal tube. Worldcon was just a pure unforced error on my part. I didn't need to be there, I would have enjoyed three weeks of random pottering about more than one week of con and two weeks of being stuck at home sick.

Maybe the appearance of normality was part of what biased me; I think it's more like, I've been getting away with some travel for community work, taking my mask off for hotel breakfasts and leading services, so I started thinking not all travel is unavoidable doom. But several thousand people during a surge is a very different beast from a few dozen people during normal-post-2021 prevalence.

[aldabra]

Yes, I am so fed up of fighting the normalcy. I am forgetting even to think about masks. (They don't sell them at King's Cross, when you discover you haven't got one.)

College says our job is to foster a collegiate atmosphere and we can't wear masks because they detract from this. (This doesn't apply to students, and a few of the Asian ones are still masking.)

They are been very generous about not enforcing the rule on me that they enforce on everyone else that we have to actually be in college. I go in on Wednesdays and mostly otherwise WFH. This is partly why I'm reluctant to jump out of the current frying pan; I don't know where I could get a comparable job that would expose me less. (My line manager has been intimating that this is up for review, but I don't think he's going to press it while I'm having mental health wobbles at him.)

[rosefox]

If it helps any, I've taken a couple of flights a year over the past few years, worn an N95 except for quick sips of water or meal bars, and never gotten sick from it. JetBlue touts its airplane HEPA filters and I'm sure most of the other major airlines similarly upgraded their fleets in 2020. The air circulation is generally pretty good in airport terminals, and it's usually easy enough to find an uncrowded seating area where you can have something to eat without someone breathing right next to you.

I have a child in public school, and schools where I am don't enforce masking, so that's my primary risk vector and one I simply can't control. But I keep reminding myself that that's a reason to be more careful in the rest of my life, not less. It is so damn hard when everyone else is "back to normal".

[aldabra]

The schools are terrifying. I'm so glad mine had aged out of the system before any of this hit. We would have failed badly with online schoolwork, and without it lockdown and especially furlough went a very long way towards repairing our relationship which had been very much stretched by school and work requirements. It made it clear to both of us that the problem wasn't us, it was the systems we had to operate in.

[anais_pf]

I'm so sorry you have Covid. Thank you for being ethical about it! May your symptoms dissipate quickly and may there be no long term consequences.

[vatine]

I mostly saw "the business meeting" (and my room), but did manage to participate in both the Friday and Saturday fencing demos (which, sadly, were somewhat non-existent in the schedule).

[liv]

Yeah, I definitely saw complaints that you pretty much had to choose between business meeting and the whole rest of the con, it ought to be a bit less of a monster! I had no idea there was fencing, I'm glad you got to do swords.

[vatine]

Yah, if I'd actually had (a) had better network access and (b) thought about the Con Discord, I would've mentioned it there. But, on the plus side, we managed to get Jill Bearup in the audience!

[silveradept]

Oof. How disappointing that you were more exposed than the policy suggested you would be, and that you and jack caught it despite all of your efforts not to.

Good that it was an excellent con experience, even if the tradeoff wasn't what you wanted.

[andrewducker]

Fingers crossed you both recover quickly.

[rosefox]

I'm so so sorry you both got sick. I hope you and Jack feel better very soon.

Part of why we didn't go to the con on Monday at all was because so many cases were being self-reported (which meant many more were going unreported) and it felt too risky. It really sucks to have to make these decisions individually instead of there being a mask mandate in place and enforced, with infrastructure support like spaces for outdoor dining and booking conference spaces with good ventilation.

Now that you mention the daily testing policy, I do vaguely recall something about that, but it wasn't reiterated before the con, and I thought it was pointless anyway. The con can't control what people do in their personal time, and in my opinion it shouldn't try. Those of us who think it's responsible to test daily at a big event will do so (L and I did) and those who don't, won't, no matter what the rules say. Also, the con wasn't giving out free tests (at least not in bulk), and getting every attendee to spend £9 on a five-pack of LFTs seemed like a clear non-starter.

I was hanging out with a friend at the Accessibility desk when a man showed up with a mask on and requested a scooter; after some back and forth, another Accessibility volunteer recognized him as someone who had been asked to leave the previous day because he'd showed up with an active, symptomatic covid infection, and was now back and claiming it was fine because he was masking and taking antivirals! He was promptly evicted, badge revoked, etc. which was actually more action than I expected to see taken, given the "live and let live" policy, but I was left struggling to comprehend the mindset that could lead to a person thinking that was okay in the first place. That's the person policies need to be made for, not folks like you who are walking around with CO2 monitors and N95 masks and a strong sense of social responsibility.

[starlady]

I thought it was a good con too, probably the best of the three Worldcons I've been to in person. I don't remember hearing about any covid policy.

I'm sorry that you and Jack both got got, and I hope you both get over it quickly.

[lovingboth]

I have been really interested to see how few people I know who did / attended lots of Edinburgh Fringe shows seem to have got anything.

Normally, being in underventilated rooms with people from around the world is a recipe for getting something, but out of about 30 people I know well enough to expect to get this sort of health update from, I know of one mid-Fringe sore throat and they were testing -ve for Covid-19.

[ephemera]

I'm sorry that your take-home was covid, rather than just good memories of a fun and interesting event

[matsushima]

It sounds like they had a good policy on paper and then didn't really enforce it… (… except the mask thing, masks should be required and exceptions applied for separately.) Not letting people even mention the policy because that's harassing people about different safety precautions? C'mon.

I hope you and Jack recover quickly and your symptoms stay at "scratchy throat, a bit sniffly" and clear up soon.