"Granny shouldn’t be out here"

The Alabama A&M junior, who spent Thursday afternoon in Miami Beach having fun and flirting with girls, said the big crowds didn’t worry him. For one, he said he believed the tropical climate in South Florida would keep the virus at bay. And he didn’t expect to run into any medically vulnerable seniors during spring break on South Beach.

“There’s no way that a girl can cough and I get it, it’s too hot,” Beck said, later adding: “Granny shouldn’t be out here anyways. It’s too many people.”…

“There is an enormous amount of people and not enough masks,” Mayor Dan Gelber said in an interview this week. “I say mask use is the exception more than the rule at this point.”

Florida’s warm weather and relatively lax COVID-19 rules have made Miami Beach an inviting destination for young people who have felt bottled up during the year-long pandemic. With March expected to bring the largest crowds South Beach has seen in more than a year, sidewalk cafes, bars and hookah lounges now fill up on the weekends — increasing the likelihood that tourists will spread COVID-19 in Miami-Dade or catch it on vacation and carry it back home. Florida leads the nation in confirmed cases of the variant coronavirus strain B.1.1.7.