Six San Francisco Bay Area counties this afternoon issued a shelter-in-place mandate that affects close to seven million people along with businesses in the area, including Apple Stores, reports The San Francisco Chronicle.
In the counties of San Francisco, Marin, Santa Clara, San Mateo, Alameda, and Contra Costa, along with the city of Berkeley, residents must stay inside and venture out only for necessities. Santa Clara county includes Apple's headquarters and many additional offices, while there are multiple Apple Stores across the six affected counties.
People must work from home unless they provide essential services like public safety, sanitation, and medical services. Pharmacies, banks, and grocery stores will remain open, as will restaurants, but only for take out. Veterinary services, gas stations, hardware stores, and other essential shops are permitted to remain open, but other non-essential stores will close.
Non-essential gatherings of any size are banned, along with non-essential travel "on foot, bicycle, scooter, automobile, or public transit."
Given the shelter-in-place order, Apple Stores in the Bay Area are not likely to be able to reopen on March 27 as planned, as the order is set to last for three weeks at this time, ending on April 7 at the earliest.
Apple on Friday closed all of its retail stores across the United States for a two week period.
The shelter-in-place order in the Bay Area is the most restrictive in the United States at this time, and have been put in place to halt the spread of the virus. The Bay Area has 251 reported cases of coronavirus at this time, but infectious disease experts believe there could be hundreds and possibly thousands of cases in the area that are undiagnosed due to testing issues.
