It’s supposed to be the culmination of six weeks of spectacle.
But instead the final of Melodiefestivalen 2020 has become a source of anxiety.
That’s because fans are concerned it might be cancelled due to coronavirus. The final venue – Friends Arena – seats over 30,000 spectators at concerts. Events of a similar size around the world have been cancelled.
Fortunately for fans, SVT sees “no reason to cancel.”
Melodifestivalen 2020 final to go ahead as planned
The news came through Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter.
Annete Helenius – Melodifestivalen Executive Producer – told the newspaper there was no reason to cancel as of today.
Helenius stressed SVT monitors the situation “daily”. But as things stand we can expect the final to go ahead. Asked the same question last Saturday, Helenius refused to make a definitive answer.
At that time, Helenius said SVT would follow the Public Health Authority’s advice.
Sweden cancels attendance at Head of Delegation’s meeting
Melfest may go ahead, but Swedish attendance at the Head of Delegation meeting won’t.
The meeting takes place in Rotterdam next Monday, but in the same news piece Helenius confirmed SVT won’t be there in person.
Christer Bjorkman warned of the possibility over the weekend:
“If SVT says we should not go, then we will not go.”
SVT calls the decision a precaution.
Helenius says, “We think we can handle that meeting with digital tools, and it just felt unnecessary.”
She also sought to squash speculation about Swedish participation in the competition in May.
“It’s far too early to say. But we are following developments like all other countries and we hope Eurovision will go ahead.”
Helenius confirmed SVT took the decision independently. Indeed, she used the interview to confirm the NPO has introduced daily monitoring and said there no risks in attending the meeting at this time. She added that as the meeting generally only requires a presentation, the feeling was this can be handled digitally.
The Heads of Delegation meeting marks the deadline to present entires for that year’s contest. It takes place on March 9.
Insane that SVT will allow three concerts with app 20700 people each despite corona virus. Seems like Wuhan deja vu ( had a conference for 40000 in Jan despite corona virus and the world thought they were idiots). What will the world think of the Swedes if this gets out of hand????
Sweden doesnt care at all!! They are taking it as one big joke!
What will you vote for this Saturday and can you send me all star card 75, 119, 122 or 123?
Overreaction to a simple flue hype. The moment the spring starts the flue fades. Besides only really old people and sickish people die of it, they are supposedly not in the audience.
I can see that you have no knowledge about how to avoid spreading diseases around the globe. It is about protecting others that are weaker than you are. Not spreading the diseas further. To save other peoples lives.
Yes but its far from spreading. Neither Sweden nor Netherlands have confirmed deaths due to virus. And no one has put travel restrictions, not even to Italy. Like most virus it is dangerous if you are at risk, healthy adults need not to fear.
If people from all Europé travel and meet in one place there is a risk that someone will carry the virus and infect many that will trasmit it further.
Yes but that is Only if it is a pandemic. It is not pandemic yet and most likely wont be either. Like most virus it probably will diminsih once spring comes. ESC is in May, which is a long time. The virus might completely die out til then
In better news Dotter has surpassed Hanna Ferm on the daily sweden top50 spotify chart! Plus overally the track has 1.4M streams, the most of any DTF finalists. Same on YouTube.
Also she has 48% chances to win in the odds!
50% now.
If odds were the actual result this would be the biggest MF winner ever!
30 people are infected with the virus in Sweden and almost all of them brought it from northern Italy.
Keep all recent tourists to Italy out of the arena?
To be fair, I first saw this as a news article on DN.se. Also Angus Quinn is not “anti swede” given how he follows Melfest every year.
With the way things are going alot of events are going to be at risk including Eurovision.
Are you using the royal “We”?
You are not that smart obviously since you don’t even understand simple questions.
The delegation are afraid of meeting. But no problems with putting more than 10000 swedes in an arena. I love swedish logic.
Unless the Swedish National health department tells them to stop/postpone the final they will go ahead and do the finals!
People have paid a lot of money to go to the MF Finals so would be a huge economic loss not to hold the finals. But the delegation have as a group decided not to go, that is their own individual and group decision. It does not affect the overall MF budget, or plans other that they do the meeting remotely. It is all about business. Money talks… I wouldn’t say it is Swedish logic, it is more business logic.
Well, delegations from all EBU countries will be present. Most of them fly to the meeting.
Thousands of people is of course also a risk. But the infected people in Sweden have just been abroad, most of them in Italy. So there is a larger risk going abroad of course
Direkt till hospital.
Vi har et resultaat.
sorry for interruption but Senhit will sing Cleopatra for San Marino in Rotterdam which is a BOP
Oh I was just about to ask if anyone heard anything on San Marino as it seems the last country to announce anything ..I hope it’s a great entry ..
People have been rumoring that it’s either for Azerbaijan or San Marino, which would make it either a B-level Azerbaijani entry or the best Sammarinese entry ever.
samira said her song will touch our hearts (lmao) probably it is not Cleopatra + however on Senhit’s Instagram there is a post of a videoclip that fits Cleopatra perfectly
She’s working with a relatively prominent staging director. Ooh, this could be really good!
It has been confirmed that Samira will sing “Cleopatra” 🙂
@infeazerbaijan has deleted the post.. maybe they changed (IctimaiTV) their mind.. also in the leaked snippet from Cleopatra sounds like Senhit’s voice ? we will have to wait until 8th of March I guess..
In other news – when other delegations weren’t present, they were fined. But not Sweden, I guess.
And the corona in the Netherlands is far from a red alert.
This makes zero sense. The final is a far higher infection risk than the delegations meeting.
How Bjorkman would rig the running order in may if he”s infected.
Infection risk in big crowds? Yes.
But there is no common sars-covi-19 in Sweden. Everyone infected has been abroad.
So gathering delegations from every EBU-country. Including those that have a common infection.
Eurovision will be held, I don’t really have any doubts about that. They don’t need an audience, the artists don’t even need to be in the Netherlands to perform. I’d be more worried about the Euros, for example.
If the Eurovision can do without an audience, well then soccer can too.
Audience is more important in football*.
It’s football not soccer.
You call it what you like and so will I. There’s no more need for all the external hoopla in a soccer tournament than in a song contest. The players could just gather in one city and play the games over the course of a week or two instead of dragging it out over two months in multiple cities. Of course, that would mean less €€€ for UEFA, which I imagine is their real concern.
ESC-fans are clearly football haters and they don’t know much. Yes I agree, 12 hosts countries is too much tho. One city is not enough tho
That’s really bad for Finland who qualified for the first time. But they should play it later then. Rather Eurovision stopped even if Cicciolina is a good song
Of course it will be held, but will it be post poned, re-scheduled? That is the question?
These events are to big to be cancelled. Euro is unlikely to move though. Because autumn is Champions League and all that. it would be impossible scheduling
If they pull out of the Hod meeting as a precaution they can just aswell pull out of esc this year in general… That will be even more high risk.
Yes. That risk is higher. But it lies further in the future. So there might be lower risks by then
I wish somebody sent a coronavirus inspired song it would totally break the internet and do really well at ESC
the mind of mine… O____O
Famous last words. Don’t tempt fate…
“Her name was Corona.
She could burn me up, mess me up, drive me wild…” Typical dance track, really.
Also, there is the sun’s “corona”, so that might be interesting to fit into the song.
Corona is also a lager, I think. “Corona you when I’m ill?” 😛
Again?
How many are infected in Sweden? The decision might have something to do with this.
24. Not as much as quite a lot of other countries
That’s the same amount the Netherlands has.
That is more then the amount of tele vote points they can count on these days.
10 has been confirmed with corona only today in stockholm and 15 in total in stockholm, 33 in sweden for now.
Incorrect. 30 confirmed.
15 was confirmed in entire country today, meaning yesterday’s number was doubled.
If any people will become infected in the Friends arena I’m positive the Eurovision (with an audience) will be suspended this year.
Hmm. Intersecting…. let’s do this!!!
Nah it was 33 by the time i wrote it.
If every single broadcaster did the same while there is not a ban on traveling, the meeting would be canceled along with eurovision. Corona virus is an excuse, someone is mad that doesn’t have control this year
Why would the meeting cancel. No need to travel for a meeting. You can just use Skype. We have them all the time in Sweden. Much better for the environment
They believe in this myth?
You put the Montenegrin flag for N. Macedonia in the Eurovision Calendar.
Well, just came out that Mohobi got malaria, so if he also get Corona that is more or less a deadly combo…the many people that have died of corona has also got some other illness or such as well , so he really needs to be careful 🙁
He spent the days between semi 3 and this week in his home in Congo and contracted it there I guess
Let’s hope Dotter is virus-proof.
Dotter is not a winner-proof atleast. It will maybe be as overrated as Fuego.
You mean the song that got second and became a bigger hit than the winner? That overrated song?
Only older and weakend people really suffer from the disease, for others it’s just like the seasonal flu which is also dangerous for those who don’t have the best immune system.
It’s normal to fear the unknown, but stay focused on the facts, not the amount of media exposure.
And the ones who are at risk of dying are not worth protecting? Eurovision is more important to you? Good to know where your priorities are.
The HOD meeting could hardly be considered a mass gathering. Why can’t they go? There has been no government advice to avoid travel completely, as far as I know.
Make sense to me, #flygskam. Why go somewhere if you can just do a Skype meeting!
From the comments in the article, it’s not related to Coronavirus but just a question of practicality.
Okay, flygskam is a better reason. I still think it’s because of the coronavirus, though – if not, then it doesn’t really belong in this article.
I am shocked right now esc singer malena ernman is motherof greta thunberg?? Whatt???
Someone is salty that he ain’t got the show producer job this year
Eurovision looks to be going ahead as planned. As this shows, short of anything else, there are always alternatives should things not be ideal.
Here we all are bashing each other, bickering and talking winners when we might not even see them live:)
Or hear them. Who knows, ESC might not happen. Olympics just announced they might move, who says ESC won’t move either?
You can’t move the events left and right like that. There is a mass technical production that takes months to build an arena.
Yes, but you can actually cancel everything you know. I mean if the virus continues to spread the attention will be on ESC to do something..
I suffer from anxiety so for me everything is a big deal. I need to be assured there will be ESC:)
Not the first time ESC had to face possible cancelation. It had moved dates before (one being that there was a labor strike that nearly paralyzed preparations back when UK hosted the contest), but that was decades ago. Regardless, surely, in any event, the EBU may have back-up plans, which hopefully won’t be the case.
1977, should have been April 2 but was on May 7
Denis is a troll.
No Ana, Ani or whatever your account name is these days, it was actually genuine concern for a contest I do very much look forward too that actually might be in focus if the virus continues to spread.
You know instead of acting like a 5 year old and giving out useless comments you could have restrained from answering or ease fear. Cause you know, there are people on this site, me including, that suffers from anxiety and need to be assured ESC will go ahead!
I understand you suffer from anxiety, but there is no need for this. Come on are you scared to take a flu? I guess not, like everyone on this planet. It’s not a global pandemic that kills 50% of the population. It’s a stronger flu, nothing more, nothing less. You don’t have to fear Eurovision will be cancelled, if Melodifestivalen doesn’t now, with an arena of 30,000 I don’t see why Eurovision should be cancelled in May with an arena of way smaller dimentions.
Well, the reason for that it COULD be cancelled is that ESC consists of potential virus-carriers from 40+ countries. And most of them has just been in an airport. If the virus happens to be in the arena, it could then easily transmit to other countries.
Yes, it’s not that deadly. Most people will not experience much when infected. But it’s still good to try and prevent the transmission. This is why other major gatherings are cancelled.
They are salty CB isn’t allowed to do the running order this year?
That is probably the dumbest thing ive ever heard, you will fill an arena with thousands of people but you cant attend a head of delegation meeting that is closed off to the public?
I wish they would scan everyone who will enter the stadium and let anyone who has a fever go home or be quarantined
The amateur dramatics of SVT and this article, making something out of nothing, amazes me
Better to be safe than sorry!
So they don’t cancel a gathering of 30.000 people but don’t send an employee to the meeting. Hilarious
Well The Netherlands isnt either, yet here we are. All this does is feed the media hysteria built up over Coronavirus.
Right – and that has health implications, too – anxiety, stress – people have enough to be worrying about already.
What about Italian fans? Italy’s a massive hotspot with 2,000 cases
30 000 is not nearly enough. Friend arena takes 55 000 during football and 75 000 during concerts. So I would estimate that it is at least 60 000 people there