HONOLULU (KHON2) — The Hawaii Department of Health announced that the total number of confirmed cases linked to a cluster of cases among McDonald’s restaurants in Kailua-Kona has gone up.
On Saturday, the DOH reported that the total was 29. But as of Sunday, April 19, it has gone up by one case.
Health officials say that the new case is an employee at a third McDonald’s located at 75-5729 Kuakini Highway. That location has voluntarily closed at this time.
The total now includes 18 employees and 12 household members.
The State DOH is conducting contact tracing for new cases and continuing to monitor employees and family members, all of whom are in isolation or quarantine. The DOH investigation of cases is ongoing.
“Our highest priority is to protect the health and well-being of our people,” said McDonald’s Owner Operator Patrick Lim. “We’ve been informed that additional employees from our Kona Commons, McDonald’s of Walmart Kona and Kailua-Kona locations have tested positive for the coronavirus and are connected to the previous set of confirmed cases. As soon as we were notified of the first confirmed cases, we immediately closed the restaurants to conduct a thorough sanitization procedure and notified The Hawaii State Department of Health. We previously added protective barriers to limit contact in our restaurants.”
Lim says that they identified and reached out to all restaurant staff who were in close contact with the employees who tested positive for the virus. He says they were advised to self-quarantine for 14 days.
“Under the guidance of the Hawaii State Department of Health, we have offered universal testing to our employees at each location,” he said.
