No Irish Parade

From the BBC:

"Coronavirus: Irish St Patrick's Day parades cancelled”

St Patrick's Day parades across the Republic of Ireland have all been cancelled over coronavirus, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has said. He announced a €430m (£375.7m) aid package for the Health Service Executive to deal with the impact of Covid-19. On Monday, Mr Varadkar said the Republic would stay in the "containment phase" for as long as possible. But it would move to the delay and mitigation phase in the coming weeks. The Irish cabinet has agreed a package of reforms for sick pay, illness benefit and supplementary benefit. They are designed to ensure that employees and the self-employed can abide by medical advice to self-isolate where appropriate, while having their income protected to a greater degree than under the current social welfare system. Irish Health Minister Simon Harris has said the coronavirus situation is very serious. He said it was going to require not just a whole of government approach, but a whole of society approach. Mr Harris told RTÉ's Morning Ireland that there was a moderate-to-high risk that Ireland would follow a pattern seen in other EU countries such as Italy, France and Germany with regard to the Covid-19 outbreak. St Patrick is the patron saint of Ireland and is celebrated across the globe every year on his feast day, 17 March. Dublin hosts the largest parade attracting an estimated 500,000 people last year. Parades are held both in the Republic of Ireland and in cities and towns across Northern Ireland. The day is celebrated on the international stage too. Last year, more than 400 landmarks in more than 50 countries turned green to mark the occasion.

Outbreak latest:    On Monday, two more cases were confirmed in the Republic of Ireland, bringing the total number there to 21. One of the patients has an underlying condition and is seriously ill. On Sunday, five people were diagnosed with coronavirus in Northern Ireland, bringing the number of cases to 12.  Health officials said both cases were community transmissions and did not involve people who had returned recently from at-risk areas. Meanwhile, Saturday's match between France and Ireland is the latest Six Nations fixture to be postponed because of concerns over the coronavirus outbreak.  The UK government has said its advice could change in the next 10 to 14 days to have people who show "even minor" signs of respiratory tract infections to self-isolate in an effort to tackle the outbreak.

^ I know many people (in Ireland and around the world) love celebrating St. Patrick’s Day. This will be a big disappoint for them. I'm curious to see if New York City, Boston and Chicago  - which all have big St. Patrick's Day parades - will cancel them too. ^

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-51806551