Staying COVID safe amongst crowd-pleasing Chicago St. Patrick's Day parades, events

CHICAGO (WLS) -- Chicagoans get to celebrate St. Patrick's Day festivities next weekend with eased up COVID restrictions.

Among the events are the dyeing of the Chicago River and both the downtown and South Side parades.

Dr. Sadiya Khan with the Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine said the best thing about these crowd-pleasing events is that they're all outdoors.

"We know that gathering outdoors is a much safer venture in the pandemic but the same rules apply," said Dr. Sadiya Khan, Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine. "Ensuring that you are vaccinated is probably most important thing in gathering safely."

However, Dr. Khan said the most effective way to stay safe is to get vaccinated. She also said it's finally safe to gather indoors.

"I think the timing is great. We've seen significant declines in the numbers and so we can say with confidence that the overall level of COVID-19 in the community is getting to that low enough level where gathering indoors without masks can feel safe. But we have to also use some common sense