Today's take-out special courtesy of Stevie MacNeil. Drone delivery only. Alex Keiths beer in a can for only $199.99 per 8-pack and a roll of TP included absolutely free. But wait! There's more! Order within the next 30 seconds and we'll throw in a 3-pack of Lysol Wipes, FREE! That's right. ABSOLUTELY FREE! Operators are standing by. ORDER NOW! ... See MoreSee Less
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After receiving calls and emails with questions like, “How come you are closed and every other restaurant is open are you still open for takeout?” (sic), I feel compelled to provide an answer. First off not every restaurant is open. For those that are, they are restricted to serving take-out food only. Ontario is slightly different in that they can also sell booze to go! Most large, full-service restaurants are shuttered completely as the variable costs of being open are too high and take-out food is generally not their forte. Joe E Cheesy’s Snack Shack exists to serve the take-out food market and is a brand new business that needs cash flow like any other business. However, in the midst of this unexpected chaos, we faced a huge dilemma that we could not reconcile. Given all the information we devoured about the COVID-19 virus, seeing what is happening in Canada, the United States and around the globe, and what the provincial and federal governments have asked us to do (actually they’re ordering us now because things are getting worse), we concluded that closing the restaurant was the responsible way to go. This was a personal choice, nothing more, nothing less.
Our quandary is that we need staff to do the cooking, although I have been known to make a decent meal for 2-4 people in one day. After deliberating back and forth, our internal jury returned the verdict; we had no right to put the health of employees in peril for a non-essential service like take-out food. Even if we ourselves could do all the cooking, the risk of “feeding” the pandemic would increase regardless of adopting new anti-virus hygiene protocols. Why so is beyond the scope of this post. If you have not taken time to learn anything about COVID-19, it’s high time you did. Admittedly it’s discouraging and confounding when the media report citizens carrying on with their lives totally oblivious to the current state of affairs, or buying into fake news or conspiracy theories, and blatantly violating directives set up to protect us. It’s even more weird when you see government personnel and elected officials making non-essential activities somehow essential for them. Stay safe! ... See MoreSee Less
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Some good info that needs sharing. Thanks BRuce Ross.
Allan, you asked a question, why all the fuss about CoV2... I will try and help a little, but it is complex, and it may require 'taking the time' to understand this virus... The piece below is a well researched and written article on it, I will try to get there more simply...
SARS CoV2 is the virus that causes COVID-19, The respiratory condition that becomes pneumonia and takes some people through the death spiral. This virus has never been in humans, so we have no natural immunity to it. The article below explains the RNA/DNA issues better than I can, but suffice to say 'there in lies the difference with influenza'... What we call the flu.
The flu virus has been in humans for eons... We have a natural immunity to many forms of it, and every year we immunize more people to the annual current forms... Usually about five different virus in our flu shots. Yes, it kills about 60,000 Americans a year, but it is estimated by CDC that over 9 million, and up to 45 million Americans get influenza a year with a 0.1% death rate on average. That's why it doesn't kill so many people!
SARS CoV2 on the other hand has a 1% up to 2,4% average death rate... It is over 10 times more deadly than influenza... And with 70 yo people the rate is around 7%; and 80 yo people over 10‰.
People with COVID-19 go through stages... If they get to needing a ventilator they have a very low chance of survival if over 70 or have concomitant disease (obesity, diabetes, cancers)... In Italy because of the lack of ventilators, they have had to prioritize younger people for vents. Also, if they survive, it is likely they will have significant scaring in their lungs.
The reason for the near panic in NYC is that they don't have enough ventilators and the infection rate doubles every 3 days... This is known as "exponential" growth... On average a sick person is passing CoV2 to 2.3 other people... In five weeks this means one patient could conceivable cause tens of thousands of others to be sick...
The virus can be passed in several ways... Thru a cough, or sneeze, or even laughter. The virus travels through the air on micro moisture bubbles, or snot! It then gets to the next potential victim when they breath it from being within range (said to be 6 feet or more). This is the case for social distancing.
The snot or moisture bubble can land on a surface... It can last there for several days (tests show a day on the cardboard box someone hands you, three days on stainless steel on the fridge door...). The people who touch those things transfer it to their mouth, nose or eyes by inadvertent touching... thereby transferring it to the next potential victim, (themselves)...This is the case for washing our hands with soap and rinsing thoroughly with water.
This is not a hoax, is not media hype, it is science! The virus is out of the genie's bottle this time, because of the various countries that weren't prepared or didn't act to stem it early. SARS, EBOLA H1N1 and others were dangerous but previous administrations jumped on them
and beat them down. HIV on the other hand was ignored by the then President for several years and got out of the genie's bottle, killing many, many people around the world.
This Coronavirus, SARS CoV2 is out of the bottle... It likely will kill an estimated 100,000 Americans... And many more if the country ignores the medical professionals. If in 2 years you tell me I was wrong, that will be great news to me, Allan... Because it will mean that you survived, and if I heard your words, so did I. The more likely reason we survive however is because you and I self-isolated successfully.
Hope this helped... The next article is definitive beyond my capacity... B
DATA POINT FROM CDC
(While the impact of flu varies, it places a substantial burden on the health of people in the United States each year. CDC estimates that influenza has resulted in between 9 million – 45 million illnesses, between 140,000 – 810,000 hospitalizations and between 12,000 – 61,000 deaths annually since 2010)
Now, click on the link for a very good article...
www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/03/23/coronavirus-isnt-alive-thats-why-its-so-hard-kill/ ... See MoreSee Less
I don't have two restaurants or employees at the moment, so I may as well spread the word of The Big Hurt that's just around the corner if the Feds and provincial/territorial governments don't act fast to support small-to-medium size enterprises. The Danish government gets it and will do whatever is necessary to protect its economy and way of life. It is surely more palatable to invest resources to protect the entities that generate jobs and the public income in the first place, and spread this cost over many years through modestly higher taxes, than to allow the economy and thousands of small businesses to crumble and fold. That cost would be multiple times higher in both monetary terms and human suffering and cast a very dark cloud for many, many years. Since you are probably in isolation, take the time to read these two articles. See, you should have listened to me and not dropped out of that economics class. :)
www.msn.com/en-nz/money/news/denmarks-idea-could-help-the-world-avoid-a-great-depression/ar-BB11x...
www.thechronicleherald.ca/business/local-business/shuttered-small-businesses-pose-potential-disas... ... See MoreSee Less
