COVID-19 outbreak at Johnson County Chick-fil-A: Staff ‘not wearing their masks’
Johnson County health officials on Thursday said an ongoing coronavirus outbreak stems from cases at a Chick-fil-A restaurant in Lenexa.
Sanmi Areola, public health director, told county commissioners at their weekly meeting that there have been up to 10 positive cases at the restaurant, “with some contacts also positive and a couple of them hospitalized.” He said the county health department is inviting about 80 staff members to get tested for the virus.
The Chick-fil-A corporate website says the restaurant, at 15919 W. 87th Street Parkway in Lenexa, is closed due to “COVID-19 related issues.” A manager at the restaurant on Thursday afternoon also said the location is closed.
While Areola did not name many specifics, he said the county has been monitoring COVID-19 outbreaks at some workplaces as the economy reopens. He said the clusters are common where employees are in close contact in an enclosed space, and “typically when people don’t use masks.”
Officials pointed out that even when a business requires masks, employees might not wear them properly, such as pulling them down under their nose in a hot kitchen, or for the entire time they work. Many customers may not wear masks as well.
“Chick-fil-A that we talked about — part of that also is because people were not wearing their masks. It’s hot, so masks may not be comfortable ... but the benefit of wearing a mask is huge,” Areola said. “Almost every time, you can see the environment is creating the opportunity for the spread.”
The cause of the outbreak is still under investigation.
While wearing masks is not mandated in Johnson County, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as well as local and national health experts, strongly recommend wearing face coverings in public, especially where social distancing measures are difficult to follow.
“Oftentimes (businesses) start out with the best intentions to wear masks,” said Elizabeth Holzschuh, county epidemiologist. “It’s really incumbent upon our businesses to identify strategies to ensure people are wearing masks.”
While county officials report that the number of new coronavirus-related hospitalizations has been declining, the number of new cases continues to rise as the county expands testing. Holzschuh said that has caused a “huge burden” on health department staff as more contact tracing and case investigation are required.
Last week, Areola said, “for a county our size, quite frankly, we are grossly understaffed.”
The county commissioners agreed at their last meeting to spend nearly $4.2 million to hire case investigators and contact tracers, plus purchase more testing supplies.
Areola has frequently said that the county needs more resources. Health experts view a robust tracing system as a key tool for understanding and containing the spread of the virus, especially as the economy reopens.
Commissioners approved the funding — the majority of which should be eligible for federal reimbursement under the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security, or CARES Act — for laboratory resources, 50,000 test kits, plus the hiring of 35 part-time, temporary contact tracers and case investigators.
And plans call for bolstering the health department by hiring more staff to the epidemiology division, including six full-time employees, costing a total of roughly $560,000 each year.
Before the package was approved, Areola previously said the health department had five staff members who do case investigation and contact tracing, and it trained about 30 additional staff members who may be pulled from their regular jobs to assist. The county also relies on volunteers, such as college students and school nurses.
Contact tracers and case investigators are tasked with researching who has been in close contact with a person infected with the virus. They then reach out to those people to let them know they may have been exposed and whether they need to quarantine.
Per federal guidelines, he said based on Johnson County’s population size, the task would require between 75 and 180 people.
As of Thursday afternoon, Johnson County had reported 1,150 coronavirus cases, and 76 residents have died from the disease. Out of more than 30,500 residents who have been tested, about 3.8% tested positive.
This story was originally published June 18, 2020 at 5:12 PM with the headline "COVID-19 outbreak at Johnson County Chick-fil-A: Staff ‘not wearing their masks’."
