Quebec will not go ahead with its planned test to hold two concerts to examine the impact of COVID-19 on large gatherings.
Caroline Proulx, the province’s tourism minister, announced the decision Wednesday, citing a rise in new novel coronavirus cases and the presence of the Delta variant.
“By making the decision now to put an end to it, we are acting responsibly to protect the health of the population and to manage public finances effectively,” Proulx said in a statement.
“We will continue to work with our festival and event promoters and public health to ensure a safe relaunch of event activities in Quebec.”
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READ MORE: Quebec to hold COVID-19 experiment in September involving 2 large-scale concerts
The pair of concerts involving a total of 25,000 people had been scheduled for September in the Quebec City area. Reseachers at Université Laval were supposed to oversee the experiment.
The cancellation comes one day after the province announced new measures to clamp down on the fourth wave of the pandemic. This includes mandating vaccines for health-care workers in regular contact with patients and making masks mandatory in post-secondary institutions.
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Quebec has seen an uptick in infections in recent weeks, with the province back above 400 new cases on Wednesday.
—With files from The Canadian Press
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