All summer long, Oregon had pretty low Covid transmission rates. I also saw LOTS of folks gathering in parks in small groups, often socially distanced and/or with masks. We are hearing from the state that transmission is primarily happening in small gatherings indoors...

And we are hearing that the number of young folks getting Covid is higher than their number in the population. I'm wondering if these same people are getting together, only now it's indoors because parks aren't set up to facilitate winter gathering.

The grass is damp and cold, and there aren't many shelters from the rain, and there's little covered seating. It's just not easy to find a place to meet up with someone if you don't have a porch or don't want to use it. So that leaves people's houses and bars and restaurants.

It's going to be a long winter, and folks are having a hard time. Our city and state missed an opportunity to create some safer (not safe, but safer) ways for people to see each other, and the summer gave folks a false sense of security.

All summer, playgrounds and some rec facilities remained officially closed. Our city and county policies unintentionally pushed people inside and to people's houses by ignoring updated transmission information.

And it's dangerous that we haven't had any sort of public health campaigns around Thanksgiving and holiday travel. The protests in Portland have shown us that people in masks can gather without nearly the kind of risk we have indoors. Yet there's no leadership on this.

Can gather outside, I mean.