With the coronavirus pandemic raging for over six months, short-term home rental company Airbnb announced a blanket ban on house parties in an overdue bid to fight the spread of Covid-19.
The new rules, announced by the company on Thursday, include a hard occupancy cap at 16 people. Guests and hosts who dare to dodge the new rules will face a ban on Airbnb’s website and might even run into legal troubles.
“Instituting a global ban on parties and events is in the best interest of public health,” Airbnb said, adding that the ban applies to all the future bookings.
The company said that some 73 percent of hosts using the service have already banned parties on their properties or allow only small-time gatherings.
The new rules further reinforce Airbnb’s rules against unauthorized parties. The service has also removed both the “event friendly” and “parties and events allowed” search filters from the house rules. Airbnb’s quest against parties began last November, following a shooting during a party at a rented house in Orinda, California, that left five people dead.
While the new coronavirus-driven move might seem a bit late, six months into the pandemic as the lockdown measures are being loosened globally, crazily packed house parties are still repeatedly making headlines and being shamed for disregard of social distancing. Some of the events, however, specifically organized by coronavirus-skeptics to prove their point, have ironically resulted in mass contagions and even deaths of party-goers.
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