Live Nation has updated its COVID-19 safety protocols to require proof of vaccination or a negative test at all of its upcoming live events.
According to a Rolling Stone report published on Saturday morning (Aug. 14), Live Nation will require all artists, staff and fans in attendance at upcoming concerts and festivals to furnish either proof of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test as a condition of entrance beginning on Oct. 4, 2021.
“Vaccines are going to be your ticket back to shows, and as of October 4th we will be following the model we developed for Lollapalooza and requiring this for artists, fans and employees at Live Nation venues and festivals everywhere possible in the US,” Live Nation President and CEO Michael Rapino said in a statement released on Friday (Aug. 13).
Live Nation previously announced that it would allow artists to decide for themselves if they want to mandate fans having to show proof of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test in order to gain entry to live shows.
The new decision to require proof of vaccinations or a negative test comes amid alarming surges in new cases and deaths in the U.S. and worldwide due to the Delta variant of COVID-19, which is more contagious than the original novel coronavirus strain that caused Live Nation and other concert groups to postpone their entire slate of live shows in 2020 due to the pandemic. In a limited number of cases, the Delta variant has also caused “breakthrough” infections in people who have been fully vaccinated.
Live Nation will also require all of its employees to be vaccinated in order to gain entry to any of the company’s live events, concert venues or corporate offices, and the company has worked up a series of best practices for artists to ask to enforce the same policies when they perform at third-party venues.
Live Nation’s Lollapalooza Festival in Chicago drew crowds of an estimated 100,000 people per day from July 29-Aug. 1, a Live Nation spokesperson tells NBC News, and did not result in a superspreader event. That event enforced vaccination and negative test mandates. The spokesperson says 12 percent of attendees said the chance to attend the festival was their reason for getting vaccinated.
By contrast, the Faster Horses Festival that took place in Michigan from July 16-18 resulted in an outbreak of 83 reported COVID-19 cases.
Local and state ordinances in some areas may supersede Live Nation’s new policy.
Another of the largest concert promotion groups in the world, AEG Presents, announced a similar mandate on Thursday (April 12), which will take effect no later than Oct. 1.
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