Friday, Aug. 27, 2021
Have any coronavirus cases on Martha’s Vineyard been linked to Obama’s 60th birthday party?
On Aug. 7, 2021, former President Barack Obama held a party for his 60th birthday on Martha’s Vineyard, an island just south of Cape Cod. The Obamas “scaled back the event to include only family and close friends” amid rising concern about the spread of the delta coronavirus variant, and asked guests to show either proof of vaccination or test results showing they were free of the virus.
The Daily Mail reported that of 158 coronavirus cases documented on the island since the date of the event, none has been attributed to the party. A local health official told the Daily Mail that after contact tracing, there haven’t been “any cases linked to the Obama party,” adding that if there were, “we’d be seeing them already.”
Official Massachusetts data groups Dukes County, which includes Martha’s Vineyard, with nearby Nantucket County. Records show the 14-day average daily infection rate rose in the counties to 67.4 per 100,000 people in the two weeks ending Aug. 21, from 46.3 in the prior two-week period.
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Sources
- Snopes Did Obama scale back ‘massive’ 60th birthday party due to COVID-19 concerns?
- Daily Mail Martha’s Vineyard Hospital bears brunt of COVID spike two weeks after Obama birthday party
- Commonwealth of Massachusetts COVID-19 response reporting
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