Houston Rodeo canceled over coronavirus concerns, prompted by Montgomery County case

Chele Summers, left, and Amber Hood of Darry Equipment Co., take down their sign after the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo closed early on Wednesday, March 11, 2020. Chele Summers, left, and Amber Hood of Darry Equipment Co., take down their sign after the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo closed early on Wednesday, March 11, 2020. Photo: Elizabeth Conley, Houston Chronicle / Staff Photographer Photo: Elizabeth Conley, Houston Chronicle / Staff Photographer Image 1 of / 105 Caption Close Houston Rodeo canceled over coronavirus concerns, prompted by Montgomery County case 1 / 105 Back to Gallery

Mayor Sylvester Turner on Wednesday ordered the shutdown of the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo due to concerns about coronavirus after a Montgomery County man with no recent travel history tested positive for COVID-19.

The Montgomery County case is the Houston region’s first known example of the virus being contracted within the community rather than from travel and directly was responsible for the decision to cancel the rodeo, Turner and Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo said at a news conference Wednesday. Montgomery County officials said the man attended a barbecue cookoff at the rodeo late last month but was not exhibiting symptoms at the time.

Turner said he signed an emergency health declaration Wednesday that will remain in place for seven days, at which point City Council could decide to extend it. Under the declaration, all events produced or permitted by the city will be canceled through the end of March, Turner said. That includes Sunday’s Tour de Houston fundraising bike ride, which officials will attempt to reschedule, the mayor said.

Hidalgo signed a similar emergency declaration Wednesday afternoon.

Rodeo officials said they were “deeply saddened” but agreed with the city’s move to cancel the popular annual event.

"As hard as this is to do, it is the right thing to do,” said Joel Crowley, president and CEO of the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo.

The rodeo closed at 4 p.m., he said.

On its website, the rodeo said it was working on a plan to refund people with tickets to future shows, but did not say when that information would be available.

Houston Rockets and Astros games are not affected by the mayor’s emergency declaration The rodeo was a permitted event at the county-owned NRG Stadium, which gave the local governments authority to shut it down. The professional sports events are not permitted in the same fashion. Both teams have sought guidance from local leaders, however.

City and county officials were unsure Wednesday how widely the Montgomery County man had traveled in the Houston area, though health officials said they expect more cases of community spread COVID-19 to be revealed in the coming days.

“We’re doing this to save lives,” said David Persse, the city’s public health authority “What we are trying to do through these very aggressive and, yes, painful decisions, is to slow down the virus."

Persse and other health officials have said a widening spread of the disease — while minor or non-fatal to most who contract the virus — could force a substantial amount of the population to seek medical treatment at the same time, potentially overwhelming the health care system. In that case, the most vulnerable patients — those over 50 — could find themselves without a hospital bed or treatment.

Public health experts mostly lauded the decision to close the rodeo.

Retired state epidemiologist Dennis Perrotta said the move should help the area “flatten the curve,” a term used to describe the rising number of cases and its burden on the health care system.

“This is not an exact science, but not only is there enough public health reasoning behind it, but there’s social issues,” Perrotta said. “Do you want to be the president of the organization that held a large venue festival and had a major outbreak spawn from that activity, where people got sick and died? Nobody wants that, not from a public health point of view and not from a legal point of view either.”

Dr. Peter Hotez, a Houston infectious disease specialist, said it would have been “tough to justify” closing the rodeo a week or two ago, before the scale of community transmission became apparent.

“The national problem has been, without any kind of testing, probably lots of areas of community transmission have gotten missed and it’s hard to make really draconian decisions without having that evidence,” Hotez said. “Now, we’re realizing there’s more community transmission than we knew about before. This is the fault at the national level not having a system in place to adequately test.”

Turner said he had “no regrets” that the actions announced Wednesday were not taken sooner. He stressed that all known cases in the area before the Montgomery County case were travel-related, and all but one were all related to the same Egyptian cruise ship.

“We’re basing the decision based on the science and the medical advice and the facts that are presented,” Turner said. “Let’s bear in mind. This is a new phenomenon. We are in new territory. And everyone is making the best judgments around the globe to try to take the necessary steps to keep people safe, to protect everyone, while at the same time realizing the people still have to work, they still have to take care of their families and their kids.”

City and county sources who have participated in coronavirus discussions in recent weeks said the idea of canceling the rodeo and other public gatherings was raised among local health officials and rodeo leaders prior to this week.

Decision makers, they said, wrestled with a challenge at the heart of the epidemic: whether to limit mass gatherings before confirming cases of “community spread,” while acknowledging that insufficient testing efforts meant such cases almost surely were already present but unconfirmed.

When the nature of the Montgomery County case came into focus Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning, however, local leaders decided action was required, the officials said.

As of Wednesday, 14 people in the Houston region have been diagnosed with COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus.

Dr. Umair Shah, executive director of Harris County Public Health, noted the World Health Organization had declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic shortly before Wednesday’s news conference, suggesting that officials around the globe view it as an extreme concern.

Turner said he decided to close down the rodeo after consulting with health experts, emphasizing the move was not “made in a vacuum.”

“This decision has not come easily, but the health and safety of the people in our region is paramount,” the mayor said.

In a statement, Montgomery County officials said they were waiting for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to confirm the positive case there before canceling any community events.

“We understand the enormous impact these events have on our community as a whole, so a decision to cancel a large event will not be taken lightly,” County Judge Mark Keough said. “We are currently monitoring this rapidly changing situation and are looking to our medical community for guidance.”

Houston Councilman Greg Travis slammed Turner’s move to cancel the rodeo. In a statement, he said council members were “absolutely blindsided” by the decision, which he said “only serves to perpetuate the artificial panic being proliferated by the media and deals a huge blow to the Houston economy.” And he said residents should decide for themselves whether to attend, writing, “We do not need a nanny state.”

The closure of the rodeo came days after HLSR officials said they had no plans to cancel the festival. In a statement on Saturday, organizers said RodeoHouston largely is a local event.

"The Rodeo is predominantly a local event, with 73% of the 2019 Rodeo visitors residing in the greater Houston area, 94% in Texas, and 99% in the U.S.," the statement read. "In contrast, 26% of the 2019 SXSW attendees were international."

The annual event began March 3 and was slated to run through March 22.

Rodeo officials stated that it was taking extra precautions and measures to ensure the health and safety of guests, including additional janitorial staff, increased cleaning schedules, more hand sanitizer stations, and additional signage reminding restroom users to wash their hands.

More than 566,000 people had attended events on the rodeo grounds as of Monday. Last year’s total attendance was more than 2.5 million people over 21 days.

Reporter Todd Ackerman contributed to this story.

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