Someone I know is trying to argue that the protests aren't at least somewhat responsible for the recent Coronavirus spike. I'm trying to debunk the idea because it's obviously bullshit and here's what I have so far:
COVID positive tests haven't visibly risen where protests have taken place because
a) the average protester is ~20 years old - the most likely group to catch COVID and to be asymptomatic/have minor symptoms. Many who have attended the events and have had contact with the virus have likely not been tested because they never experienced severe symptoms or any at all. These people then likely passed the virus on to someone older/vulnerable who then did test positive. This idea is further bolstered by the fact that first responders at the events, especially police, have seen an uptick in positive tests over the last few weeks.
b) the mass majority of protesters often don't live in the immediate area they're protesting at, so those who did contact the virus and tested positive were not attributed as a positive recorded in that area. This allows "experts" to say the protests did not cause a spike in the area - a half truth, because it instead occurred in the surrounding areas.
c) several of the more liberal cities have stated that they will no longer ask if someone has attended a protest when conducting contact tracing, confounding the issue further. And even if they do ask, how much do you trust someone who has a strong distrust in authority to tell the truth? Especially if they're trying to avoid having the protests blamed for the spike.
d) are you really going to argue that millions of people, over several weeks, standing shoulder to shoulder is really not going to have an effect on virus spread - but a family going out to dinner will? Face masks aren't going to do shit at a protest, especially considering that they would be always falling off from the yelling and marching. Even when going to the grocery store, my mask needs to be re-positioned every other minute. And that's not factoring in the 1/3rd or more of people that don't wear them properly
e) The conservative protests that everyone was labeling as super-spreader, grandma killing events were minuscule in size and far, far less widespread compared to what we've seen in the last month. Considering the assumption that the wearing of masks likely make little difference in protest situations: if you were among those who believe the lockdown protests in April prevented the curve from going flat, you have to consider these protests played a role in the spike.
If anyone has any other points I missed, let me know.