Disney World Bans Eating and Drinking While Walking to Promote Wearing Face Masks
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Disney World visitors can no longer eat and drink while walking around the theme park because too many people weren’t wearing face masks.
The park’s website updated its face mask policy, as noted by several Disney World fan blogs over the weekend. It still allows guests to remove their face masks while eating or drinking, but asks that they remain stationary and socially distant from other people as they do it.
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“Face coverings are required for all guests (ages 2 and up) and cast members. Please bring your own face coverings and wear them at all times, except when dining or swimming. You may remove your face covering while actively eating or drinking, but you should be stationary and maintain appropriate physical distancing,” the park’s website now says under the face coverings section.
Face masks are required in all areas of Disney World, but it was possible to use the eating and drinking loophole to avoid wearing them.
The park has been under fire for reopening in Florida, where coronavirus cases have skyrocketed recently, after it originally closed in March when the coronavirus pandemic was in early stages in the U.S.
Dr. Anne Rimoin, a professor of epidemiology at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health and the leader of the UCLA COVID-19 Rapid Response Initiative, told Variety in early July that it was a “terrible idea to be opening right now.”
To help prevent the spread of coronavirus at the park, Disney World has taken some extra precautions, such as enforcing enhanced cleaning to high-traffic areas, adding signs and barriers to promote social distancing and creating cashless services to reduce physical contact.
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