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Province offers “guidance” to grocery stores

Provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry has made some of the COVID-19 precautions already being used by Sunshine Coast grocery stores official “guidance” for grocery and retail stores.
Grocery Shelf

Provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry has made some of the COVID-19 precautions already being used by Sunshine Coast grocery stores official “guidance” for grocery and retail stores. 

The measures outlined in a March 29 bulletin have already been instituted by the major grocery stores here on the Coast. 

Henry said in the bulletin that after she issued the order prohibiting gatherings of more than 50 people, “many retail food and grocery store owners have asked whether or not the PHO’s order prohibiting mass gatherings of 50 or more people applies to them.” 

Henry’s bulletin said, “While this order does not directly apply to the retail food and grocery industry, the spirit of the order should be followed. This means that, for example, in large grocery stores where it is feasible to have more than 50 people present at one time, it is permissible to do so provided that appropriate physical distancing can be maintained.” 

Retail food and grocery stores are an essential service in every community, the bulletin noted. 

The bulletin asks store managers to enhance their sanitation plan and schedule, ensuring staff are practising proper hygiene, including frequent hand washing, only coughing or sneezing into an elbow, and avoiding touching one’s face. 

Other guidance outlined in the bulletin includes, but isn’t limited to: 

• Having hand sanitizer stations available near doors, pay stations and other “high-touch locations.” 

• Providing clean carry-out bags for purchased food and grocery products; customers should not use their own containers, reusable bags or boxes. 

• Ensuring cones or tape markers are in place every two metres to provide customers with visible queues that support physical distancing. 

• Using physical queue-line controls, such as crowd control cordons at entrances and in checkout lines outside the stores. 

• Do not sell bulk items, except via gravity feed bins or where staff dispense the bulk items.