Closing restaurants should not be an option now, Asad Umar

HP Newsroom

Lahore Restaurants Association (LRA), All Pakistan Restaurants Association (APRA) and Islamabad Restaurants Association (IRA) have written open letters to National Command & Operation Center (NCOC) Chairman Asad Umar telling him not to close the restaurants due to the ongoing increase in Covid-19 cases.

According to the details, LRA, APRA and IRA have written open letter to Asad Umar requesting him not to even think of closing the restaurants of the country.

The restaurants associations in their letters asked NCOC chairman that restaurants were opened on July 1 after a huge gap of seven months and they do not afford to be closed again.

The associations wrote to Asad Umar in the pretext of a looming threat of closing down the restaurants countrywide again due to a rise in the Covid-19 cases across the country.

The letters stated that the ongoing rise in the Covid-19 cases was not due to the opening of the restaurants because the current rise was witnessed two days prior to the opening of the restaurants.

The letters further explained that during earlier waves the Covid-19 cases rose quite high even when the restaurants were completely closed so the current rise could not be attributed to the opening of tehe restaurants.

The restaurants associations also stated that all the employees at the restaurants were already vaccinated and it would also be ensured that the guests must be vaccinated too. Keeping the fact in view that the standard operating procedures (SOPs) would be strictly followed within the premises, the NCOC must not go for closing down the restaurants again as it was unbearable for the owners of the restaurants to sustain the businesses in this situation, they added further.

The letters also stated that all the restaurants across the country would observe full adherence to the Covid-19 SOPs hence closing them should not be an option.