Coronavirus concerns postpone Sacramento Lunar New Year celebration, organizers say
The Chinese New Year Culture Association has chosen to postpone a Lunar New Year celebration in Sacramento that had been set for early February due to the ongoing coronavirus outbreak, event organizers said Wednesday.
Association board member Wei Zhang confirmed the postponement in an email Wednesday to The Sacramento Bee, saying a new date has not yet been set.
“With the current outbreak of (novel) coronavirus and the lockdown of the city Wuhan, the risk of spreading the SARS-like virus throughout Asia and across the world is very high, especially in the Asian communities,” the board said in a written statement. “... With consultation of many medical experts, the CYNCA board has made one of the hardest decisions to postpone the CYNCA event on February 8th, 2020 at Hiram Johnson High School.”
A rehearsal for the event that had been scheduled for Saturday is also postponed, the statement said.
All “sponsorships, vendor agreements, contracted services and performance arrangements” will remain in place for the event’s rescheduled date, the cultural association said.
The cultural group says it will announce a new schedule for the event and rehearsal in accordance with Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines.
The announcement comes two days after the city of Elk Grove announced the cancellation of its own local Lunar New Year celebration, which had been set for this Friday at the The Center at District56.
As of Wednesday, Sacramento County had not any reported cases of the rapidly spreading coronavirus, but at least two confirmed cases had been reported in Southern California: one in Los Angeles County and one in Orange County, public health officials said this week.
