LAST UPDATE | 12 Mar 2020

THE ST PATRICK’S Festival has announced the cancellation of its festival cultural programme, which it had been planned to run over the weekend.

The cultural programme included indoor events that had been deemed safe to date, as well as many events that are presented by external partners of the festival.

Many of these events had been planned for this holiday weekend, despite the cancellation by the government of all St Patrick’s Day parades last Monday.

In a statement this afternoon, the St Patrick’s Festival said it had taken the decision to cancel these events in line with the wider actions being taken in response to the constantly changing nature of the coronavirus global health crisis.

The decision was circulated shortly after the government’s announcement this morning regarding the spread of the coronavirus, Covid-19.

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar gave a press conference from New York, in which he ordered that schools, colleges and childcare facilities should close from 6 pm this evening to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

All gatherings of over 100 (indoor) and 500 (outdoor) were also cancelled, as well as the closing of all museums, galleries and tourism sites.

In a similar development this afternoon, MCD Productions announced it was cancelling all of its events that fall under the government’s directive.

In a statement, MCD said it was working with artists and venues to reschedule all dates and that original tickets purchased for events would remain valid.

Other events and locations which have been closed or cancelled include: 

• CopperFaceJacks nightclub in Dublin 
• Reardon’s and Voodoo Rooms in Cork
• CenterParcs in Longford
• All horse racing meetings in Ireland
• A significant number of events associated with Galway 2020 European Capital of Culture
• FlyeFit Gyms
• All GAA matches
• All Airtricity League of Ireland matches 

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St Patrick’s Festival organisers said they were “acting in the best interests of public health and safety and in an effort to play our part in the nationwide efforts to contain the spread of the coronavirus.”

“While extremely disappointing, our paramount commitment is to the wellbeing of our artists and participants, our audiences and communities and our own Festival team”, the statement said.

A spokesperson said, “while the Festival’s own events are being cancelled, other events that appear in the programme may still be proceeding and we support the individual decisions of all our partners regarding their own events.”

Anyone seeking further information is being urged to check www.stpatricksfestival.ie for further details.