With more and more places reopening, health experts are urging people to enjoy them responsibly.
Dr. Nikita Desai, a pulmonary and critical care physician at Cleveland Clinic, says she and other health professionals want people to take advantage of reopenings, but they might have to make some tweaks to their typical summer trips.
Dr. Desai says the greatest risk of transmission for COVID-19 is still from person to person through the spread of respiratory droplets. She says the best way to protect yourself is of course by wearing a mask and washing your hands, but also limiting close contact with other people.
She says air travel is especially risky because of the enclosed space in planes, so doing outdoor recreational activities that you can easily drive to are probably the best bet for families. However, she says only immediate or close family who live together should travel together.
With amusement parks now allowed to reopen, Dr. Desai says it's one of the safer options for families this summer.
“It’s outdoor, you've got wide open spaces and you are able to keep distance to a certain extent, wearing masks when you're standing in line is going to be really important for those times when you are in closer contact with people. I think when it comes to eating and people are taking their masks off - trying to keep as much distance maybe going to a different side of the park or a different bench to make sure that you have distance between you and people that are also not wearing masks,” Dr. Desai said.
Dr. Desai says this is probably going to be the year of the road trip for many families. She encourages people to pack plenty of their own supplies so they can minimize their time in stores before they get to their destination.
Jade Jarvis is a reporter at News 5 Cleveland. Follow her on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
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