McDonald’s will require that customers at their U.S. restaurants wear a mask or other face covering beginning next month, the fast-food giant announced Friday.
Citing its effectiveness at slowing the spread of COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, McDonald’s said customers must cover their faces indoors starting Aug. 1.
“While nearly 82% of our restaurants are in states or localities that require facial coverings for both crew and customers today, it’s important we protect the safety of all employees and customers,” McDonald’s executives stressed in a news release.
“The intent of this policy is to take a proactive approach and focus on quickly finding solutions when customers are unable or unwilling to wear a face covering,” explained Joe Erlinger, McDonald’s USA president, and Mark Salebra, chair of McDonald’s national franchise leadership alliance. “In those situations where a customer declines to wear a face covering, we’ll put in place additional procedures to take care of them in a friendly, expedited way.”
McDonald’s plans to train its staff about the new policy and will also make “de-escalation training” resources available to employees, the executive added.
COVID-19 is transmitted from person-to-person and largely by droplets expelled when a carrier talks, coughs or sneezes. Public health officials accordingly recommend people adopt wearing masks in public in an effort to mitigate the coronavirus pandemic, which has infected millions of people worldwide since being discovered late last year in Wuhan, China.
McDonald’s has more than 14,000 locations throughout the U.S. as of 2015.
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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