People were excited to go back to shopping malls across the country on our first day out of lockdown yesterday as businesses adopted disease prevention and crowd control to try to stop the risk of a second wave of Covid-19 infections.
The Covid-19 pandemic saw a shutdown of department stores, community malls and smaller shopping centres for almost two months before this week. With more businesses and leisure activities allowed to resume on Sunday, a mass rush to these premises was expected.
Long queues were observed at several malls in Bangkok and other areas even before opening hours. Shoppers were asked to wear masks, made to register before entering the premises and reminded to keep a safe distance from each other.
Overall, the reopening proceeded with few hiccups under disease control measures such as social distancing and temperature checking. However, large crowds had gathered at the IKEA store in Bang Na on Sunday, forcing the outlet to close temporarily.
At 2.35pm, IKEA announced on its Facebook page that it had to close temporarily due tonumbers of people. The outlet apologised but stated that it had to keep the number of shoppers under the maximum operating capacity under social distancing rules.
Photos of large shopper turnout at the furniture store drew cautious messages from netizens who urged each other to avoid going out unless necessary.
A mall worker also expressed concerns about the big rush back to public venues like shopping centres, saying social distancing was hard to maintain when too many people come together in the same place.
"We're now open for business. So it is best to visit on weekdays," a worker said.
Some hiccups were reported as shoppers tried to register using a smartphone application called "Thai Chana" which went online on Sunday.
The application was developed to help safety for both customers and businesses and shoppers could see if stores were congested and decide if they should move to other less crowded ones.
Full article at Source Bangkok Post
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