The case for doing everything outside

If you want to reopen the economy, you have to think outside of the building (weather permitting, of course)

Diners.
(Image credit: Illustrated | Getty Images, iStock)

There are many things we don't know about COVID-19. But we do know being outside is safer than being inside, where we're forced physically closer together and ventilation systems are a known culprit in spreading infection.

It's not impossible to catch the coronavirus outdoors, but public health experts consider outside transmission extremely unlikely if people take appropriate precautions. "I think outdoors is so much better than indoors in almost all cases," Virginia Tech engineering professor and aerosol expert Linsey Marr told The New York Times. "There's so much dilution that happens outdoors. As long as you're staying at least 6 feet apart, I think the risk is very low."

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Bonnie Kristian

Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.