Here's what health experts are doing for the holidays

Nina Bryant will cook a feast for Thanksgiving this year, as always.

Bryant works as an executive chef. But in her own family, she's the one everyone depends on to prepare her grandmother's recipes, which spark memories at the holidays. So along with a turkey, Bryant will make her grandmother's sweet potato souffle, and fingerling potatoes with tender asparagus.

This time, because of the pandemic, she'll do it all several days before Thanksgiving, then ship portions from her home in Florida to her family around the country.

That same week, Jeannine Thibodeau plans to go all out as well. She'll bake brownies three days in advance. Then she'll roast a turkey, along with “about 5 pounds of mashed potatoes and gravy and stuffing and green beans and cranberry sauce.”

Since she can't welcome the friends she'd normally invite, she'll pack ample portions in gift bags with handwritten notes, then place the bags on her stoop for contactless pickup on Thanksgiving Day.

Once mealtime arrives, Bryant and Thibodeaux both plan to fire up digital devices and connect with loved ones over Zoom. Family and friends will eat together, apart, sharing in the communal experience of a holiday meal without being able to ask each other to pass the gravy.

If ever there were a year when people could use the comfort of a big holiday dinner, this is it. Yet in 2020, a joyful, multigenerational meal around a crowded, indoor dinner table is a potentially high-risk activity.

“My Thanksgiving is going to look very different this year,” Dr. Anthony Fauci told CBS Evening News recently. The infectious-disease expert said his children won't be coming in from out of town “out of concern for me and my age.”

Jennifer Fliss will serve dessert in her Seattle driveway under a pop-up tent this Thanksgiving. She already tested out the process by sharing a socially distanced Rosh Hashanah dinner there with another family.

“Traditions are great,” Fliss says. “But it's OK if you do something different.”

She's wondering if this disrupted holiday season will give rise to new traditions. In the future, she says, families might say, “Oh, we started this tradition of eating dessert outside because of that one year we ate it outside.” This crisis, she says, “could be the entryway into something.”

Anne Monroe, an epidemiologist at George Washington University's Milken Institute School of Public Health, gave this advice to those considering travel to visit relatives for Thanksgiving or December holidays: “Your perception of safety may not match reality.”

She warned that gatherings where people “perceive” they are safe and in a small group could still pose danger. If the gathering is indoors, she said, and even if only one person has contracted COVID-19, it can easily spread. In Washington, D.C., Monroe said, health experts have found about 25% of new cases involve people who had been attending small social gatherings at homes.

“Don't let your guard down,” Monroe said. “Minimize your risk as much as possible.” She advises people who gather to stay outdoors, stay six feet apart and wear masks.”

Are you going to get tested before your travels? If so, how and when?

William Petri, a professor of infectious diseases at the University of Virginia School of Medicine, said he is not traveling for the Thanksgiving holiday but is driving with his wife in early November to see a newborn granddaughter in Tampa. Petri said before he travels to Florida, he and his wife will quarantine for several days, get tested and be sure they are negative for the virus. They will pack food in a cooler and only stop to use the restroom.

If you're traveling, are you staying overnight at other people's houses?

Once he gets to his son's house in Florida, Petri said he and his wife won't wear masks because they will have been tested for the coronavirus.

Staying at a hotel, he said, would pose a “greater risk” because you're “exposed to strangers in an elevator or stairwell or maybe someone who has COVID-19 touches a doorknob and it's not sanitized.”

Are you traveling by plane?

Neil Sehgal, an assistant professor of health policy and management at the University of Maryland School of Public Health, said he canceled his normal holiday travels to California to see family.

Air travel, Sehgal said, is safe “as long as the plane basically picks you up from your house.” Studies have shown that the in-flight ventilation is safe, but the air inside a shuttle bus to a rental car or being close to people at an airport or indoor restaurant is not ideal.

His advice for those who plan to travel: quarantine at your house for three days before your trip, then get tested. Wait five to seven days for your results and then if your results are negative, travel with a medical-grade face covering if flying to the destination.

For those who want to have a gathering of friends and family in person for Thanksgiving, what things should they consider?

Petri advised that if people try to gather in person, they keep it small and have people over who have been wearing masks and socially distancing during the pandemic.

He agreed with other experts: Stay outdoors, social distance and don't invite people who are “disregarding safety precautions.” And be mindful of the age mix of the attendees, he said.

“If you're 80, your risk of dying from COVID-19 is 20 times higher than that of a 50-year-old,” Petri said. He suggested not visiting or inviting someone to Thanksgiving dinner who might have underlying health conditions and be high risk.