Are you going to eat out soon?

[Cannot_Wait_4Disney]

For those who say they don't want to risk their lives by going out to eat, unless that individual is in a *very* small class of immunocompromised persons, the risk of death while driving to and from the restaurant is exponentially greater than the risk of contracting and later dying from COVID-19 due to that excursion.

If the argument is that they don't want to contribute to the spread of the virus or they live with an at-risk individual, that's a different story.

One risk doesn't negate the other. They are in fact additive so your argument is invalid.
But even your statement that the risk of driving is "exponentially larger" is questionable. The death rate for autos is 12.5 per billion vehicle miles. So unless you're going to drive quite a distance to the restaurant, the risk of death from driving say 10 miles to a restaurant is quite small indeed. And that is especially so if you don't reach highway speeds on your route and aren't driving drunk and are a good driver.
Auto crashes killed a hair over 100 a day in 2018. And 16% of those were pedestrians that were hit. Corona has been at 15-20 times that number for quite some time.

Sorry, this isn't communist China, never going to happen.

Where are we as a society when not wearing a mask becomes our freedom hill to die on? Hosed. Completely hosed. Is it really too much to ask to wear a mask?
I'm not suggesting we weld peoples doors shut or kidnap people out of their houses like China did. But we could certainly be doing a much better job of contact tracing and isolating than we are. And certainly when someone is known to have it and won't quarantine, there needs to be a harsher reaction than "Don't do it again."
I like this meme.

 

[jrmasm]

No way.

 

[kbuck504]

No because I have 3 small kids and eating out is more of a chore. I have done take out. I feel weird overall going anywhere. I feel like everyone is judging your choices. It is an odd time we are in. This is coming from a person who isn't touchy and likes my personal space normally.

 

[RamblingMad]

I didn't expect so many people to say they would avoid restaurants. This is problematic. Restaurants will open, bring back their staff, and very few people will show up.

What would it take for you to return to a restaurant?

 

[jlwhitney]

I didn't expect so many people to say they would avoid restaurants. This problematic. Restaurants will open, bring back their staff, and very few people will show up.

What would it take for you to return to a restaurant?

restaurants in my area are staying busy though 25% capacity isn’t much , plenty are going out

 

[adkkev]

Some local restaurants (I.e., not chain restaurants) appear to be doing better with take out than they did with in house dining. From a planning standpoint, they are limiting the quantities of meals (dinners, for example) that they are selling in a particular time frame, allowing the restaurant to have better control over their inventory, etc. For example, a local restaurant offered a take home Mother’s Day Brunch package for the hours of 9am to 2 pm today. You had to order on Friday from 2 to 6pm. They capped the number of orders at 150. By 5pm Friday they posted on FB that they had met their cap and were taking no more orders. We ordered on Friday, picked up today at 10:30am, and the food was great!!

 

[AustinMommyofThree]

38,000 Americans die in car crashes each year. 80,000 Americans have died in 2 months from covid. I really don’t think anyone should be making the car crash analogy anymore, especially when the list of risk factors is not very small.

I was about to post this exact same thing, and it bears repeating often as the people drawing this false analogy need to be corrected. Over the past two months one has a 1,200% greater chance of dying from COVID-19 than in a car accident.

As to the question at hand, no, we will not be dining out for quite a while.

 

[JenBush]

I don't go out to eat often, but over quarantine I have ordered take out several times and will probably visit some of my favorite spots within a couple weeks of opening. I don't want to deal with the opening madness though that will probably happen the first few days of allowing restaurants to fully reopen.

Edit: I would definitely feel different about eating out soon if I had pre-existing conditions or lived with someone who was more at risk of covid-19 complications.

 

[Elle23]

I would eat at a restaurant in a heartbeat, but the fam isn’t on board yet.

 

[disneychrista]

What would it take for you to return to a restaurant?

For me, it will take others being the guinea pigs first. Let others go out and see what happens. If new cases stay low after 30 days then I might be okay. But as I already stated I don't dine in very often.

 

[ronandannette]

I didn't expect so many people to say they would avoid restaurants. This is problematic. Restaurants will open, bring back their staff, and very few people will show up.

What would it take for you to return to a restaurant?

Yep - I think a great number of these businesses will fail and having to staff-up and re-stock now for a small number of customers will actually speed their demise.

I'll go back to restaurants when conditions allow for the experience to be what it used to - a chance to freely meet with friends over good food in a nice ambiance. That is NOT waiting outside in my car to be seated in a room with hazard tape closing off half-the tables, having to limit my party size and being served on disposable plates and cutlery by staff in PPE.

 

[jlwhitney]

Yep - I think a great number of these businesses will fail and having to staff-up and re-stock now for a small number of customers will actually speed their demise.

I'll go back to restaurants when conditions allow for the experience to be what it used to - a chance to freely meet with friends over good food in a nice ambiance. That is NOT waiting outside in my car to be seated in a room with hazard tape closing off half-the tables, having to limit my party size and being served on disposable plates and cutlery by staff in PPE.

We have eaten out 3 times and all real dishes. I much prefer waiting in the car for table to be ready then crammed into the tiny waiting areas. No hazard tape, they just knew what tables they could use or not use. Today we had 8 at our table with no issue.

 

[ronandannette]

We have eaten out 3 times and all real dishes. I much prefer waiting in the car for table to be ready then crammed into the tiny waiting areas. No hazard tape, they just knew what tables they could use or not use. Today we had 8 at our table with no issue.

Of all the anecdotal reports I've heard (mostly here on the DIS - things are not open locally), yours might be the first that makes it sound so near-normal.

 

[SaintsManiac]

For me, it will take others being the guinea pigs first. Let others go out and see what happens. If new cases stay low after 30 days then I might be okay. But as I already stated I don't dine in very often.

I feel the same way. Louisiana has been too much of a hot spot for me to jump in just yet.

 

[shh]

I didn't expect so many people to say they would avoid restaurants. This is problematic. Restaurants will open, bring back their staff, and very few people will show up.

What would it take for you to return to a restaurant?

Advertising exactly HOW or what steps they were taking in the kitchen and front of the house to keep people safe - it's more than just spacing tables. See upthread example one poster gave of 2 restaurants in their area and how differently they approached it.

When I dine out, I have no idea what's going on in the kitchen - and during normal times, I could ignore that for my own sanity. I don't feel I can now.

 

[DisLiss]

Nope.

 

[RamblingMad]

Advertising exactly HOW or what steps they were taking in the kitchen and front of the house to keep people safe - it's more than just spacing tables. See upthread example one poster gave of 2 restaurants in their area and how differently they approached it.

When I dine out, I have no idea what's going on in the kitchen - and during normal times, I could ignore that for my own sanity. I don't feel I can now.

The problem is that state guidance isn't very specific at least where I live now. It provides restaurants a lot of flexibility, so your experience in one restaurant will be very different in another one.

The challenge is how do we get back to some semblance of normal and minimize the spread. Having restaurants open will cause an increase in number of cases. But I have no idea how many.

 

[ReneeA]

No. I live in Detroit (a major hot spot), I work with many hospital system's ICUs and see what is happening. My DH also has several of the top comorbidities and he wouldn't do well if he were to get sick.

However, this is not easy for us since we got out- a lot. We go out Friday and Saturday, and meet friends and/or relatives for drinks frequently during the week too. I miss my social life.

 

[jlwhitney]

Of all the anecdotal reports I've heard (mostly here on the DIS - things are not open locally), yours might be the first that makes it sound so near-normal.

2 of the 3 places were local places vs corporate chains. We had a fantastic Mother’s Day lunch today, was so nice to be out. No one was crowded on top of each other. Walmart is by far more crowded then any of our dining choices.

 

[DisLiss]

I didn't expect so many people to say they would avoid restaurants. This is problematic. Restaurants will open, bring back their staff, and very few people will show up.

I think restaurants are aware of it and that's one reason why some will stick to take-out/delivery only for awhile. (Capacity issues would be the second big reason to stick with delivery/take-out only for awhile.)