Shopping malls are preparing to reopen on Tuesday of next week, and with their reopening come a wave a new coronavirus related regulations from the Heath Ministry.
The government is slowly allowing for businesses to get back to normal, or as normal as possible while still upholding the Health Ministry's coronavirus regulations in an effort to contain the virus in public areas. Last week businesses were allowed to reopen providing they follow the government's purple ribbon status. Malls will be divided up into 5,000 sq km sections each with its own entrance and exit, Kan News reports.
As people enter the Health Ministry requires that there be a strict registration of visitors upon their entrance, and people will be required to present identification to an assigned authority according to Kan News. Visitors will be required to present identification and re-register upon entering each section of the mall.Both mall owners and the Finance Ministry oppose the claims made that these added regulations will scare away consumers from malls.
Additionally an app to track customers in malls is being developed, Health Ministry director-general Moshe Bar Siman Tov said on Monday in a meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and representatives of the National Security Council and vendors associations, Haaretz reported.
People entering the premises would be compelled to download it, receive a QR code (a two-dimensional barcode) and then scan it in the different stores they visit. Their itinerary would be registered, so that if they were exposed to someone who tested positive for the coronavirus, they could be ordered to self-isolate quickly. These decisions were made in order to ease potential epidemiological investigations opened on the whereabouts of people who have contracted the virus. Rossella Tercatin contributed to this report.