How to Trick-or-Treat During a Pandemic

You could say Halloween is a frighteningly fun time. Little ghosts and goblins and superheroes run door to door, trick or treating for candy surprises. Adults even get into the act with costume parties.

But Halloween in a pandemic becomes scary for entirely different reasons and Duke University medical experts say that means the holiday needs to be very different this year.

“Trick or treat will not be as normal this year,” said Dr. Emmanuel Walter, Chief Medical Officer with the Duke Human Vaccine Institute, speaking on a conference call with journalists around the nation. “I understand everybody is kind of fatigued from COVID, but I just have real concerns about trick or treat as usual going door to door with large crowds of kids. I just think that’s a perfect way to potentially spread the virus.”

Instead, the medical experts recommended smaller family events such as pumpkin carving, scavenger hunts around the house or movie nights.

The doctors also cautioned against large social gatherings/costume parties for older teens and adults.

“If you potentially mix alcohol in with those kinds of events, you really risk a high-transmission, super-spreader type of event,” adds Walter. “I really would caution people against larger gatherings.”

Minimizing risk while trick or treating

But if you are really compelled to trick or treat, here are suggestions for doing it safely:

1. Make sure your children wear masks, not just Halloween masks. Costume masks won’t protect against Covid-19. Incorporate a cloth or surgical mask into the costume.
2. Don’t trick or treat in large groups.
3. If you are handing out candy, consider putting the candy in small, individual bags and letting kids each take a bag. Wear a mask as you hand out candy. Better yet, put the bags at the top of the driveway so kids can take them from there, which reduces the interactions.
4. If your child needs to reach into a bucket for candy, use hand sanitizer to sterilize their hands right away.

The good news is that the medical researchers believe Halloween 2021 should be at least a little more normal, because there are currently many COVID-19 vaccines in various clinical trial stages.

“I’m hopeful we have a vaccine by mid-next year and things may normalize a little bit more,” Walter said. “But does that mean we’ll be back to normal; I don’t know that I can guarantee that at this point.”