This Saturday’s Burnham-On-Sea Food Festival has been cancelled due to concerns over an ‘alarming rise’ in local coronavirus cases.
The organisers from eat:Festivals have taken the decision not to proceed with the planned event.
A spokesperson told Burnham-On-Sea.com on Tuesday (October 20th): “We have had a scheduled call with the Civil Contingencies officer for Sedgemoor District Council and a representative of the Director of Public Health for Somerset.”
“We agreed that, with the infection rate rising alarmingly over the past few days in the Burnham-On-Sea area, the only way for us to contribute to the protection of public health is to cancel eat:Burnham.”
“This is done with heavy hearts but our producers’ and the public’s safety are our primary concerns. We looked at how we could adapt the market further but the consensus was that, in these conditions, the event is too popular to be able to maintain the covid-secure status we have worked so hard to achieve.”
“Since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic the District Council environmental health teams and Somerset County Council Public Health have been working with event organisers such as eat:Festivals, to ensure that events in Somerset proceed and comply with the Covid-19 secure standards established by central government, with the aim of reducing the risk of transmission of the virus.”
A representative of the Director of Public Health for Somerset adds: “eat:Festivals have done everything we have asked of them (and more) to ensure that events go ahead with the minimum of risk.”
“Whilst our rates of Covid infection in Somerset remain lower than the national picture, rates in Somerset are increasing. At the time of writing the Somerset rate is 39 per 100,000 population.”
“Rates for the Sedgemoor district are higher than this rate at 49.8/100,000, from the 10-16th October. The Sedgemoor cases are concentrated in the Brean and Burnham area at the moment and subject to some focused work. Our rates will continue to rise and we must do everything we can to prevent the spread.“
“It is therefore on the advice of the Director of Public Health that eat:Festivals have taken the difficult decision to cancel the eat:Burnham market this weekend, 24th October.”
The eat:Festivals team are meeting with Somerset County Council and the relevant District Council officers next week to review the Christmas Festivals they have planned.
