Should you eat in a restaurant? Only if you do that, says Dr Fauci

Dr Anthony Fauci recently spoke about how to eat safely in a restaurant during the novel coronavirus pandemic.

What is happening?

Fauci told CNN on Tuesday night that people should be careful not eating at a restaurant during the pandemic. But, he said, it can be done if it’s “done carefully.”

• “If you dine inside, you do it in a spaced fashion where you don’t have people sitting next to each other,” he told CNN Tuesday night.
• He said “good air circulation” is important. And, he says, you’ll want to avoid being in places where you breathe other people’s breath.

Fauci told CNN he is aware of the economic problems restaurants are facing due to the coronavirus pandemic.

• “You know, people sometimes think that public health officials are oblivious to economics. Not at all – I mean, we’re very empathetic about it, ”Fauci said. “But we still need to maintain public health measures if we are to bypass this epidemic.”

Restaurant food study

A September study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that going out to eat at a restaurant may be riskier than other activities.

• The study found that those who tested positive for COVID-19 were twice as likely as those who tested negative to have reported going to a restaurant before being infected, as I wrote for the Deseret News.
• The CDC has defined a restaurant as “any area designated by the restaurant, including indoor, patio, and outdoor seating.”

“The results of a case-control investigation of symptomatic outpatients from 11 U.S. health care facilities found that close contact with people with known COVID-19 or visiting places with dining options and drinking on-site was associated with COVID-19 positivity.