After cleaning, Subway re-opens in Sharbot Lake, with alternate staff

Jeff Green | Nov 30, 2020

(Update - No new cases in Central Frontenac between Friday, November 27 and Wednesday, December 2. Medical Officer of Health says cases at Sharbot Lake businesses are "travel related, pose no risk to the public"

Three staff members at the Sharbot Lake Subway restaurant tested positive for COVID-19 late last week. 

Over the weekend the store was cleaned using bio-firm and electrostatic techniques, and is re-opening today (November 30) with the franchise owner, Anil Gajar, working alone.

Gajar also owns another Subway franchise in Eastern Ontario. A total of four employees work in Sharbot Lake store, including the store manager. Early last week, one of the employees was planning to travel oversees, and in order to do so he took a COVID-19 test. On Thursday, (November 26) the test came back positive.

“They called me from the store to tell me the result, and we closed the store right away” said Gajar, in a phone interview on Monday morning (November 30). “The three other employees have all been tested and are now in isolation.”

Of the three tests, two were positive. All three are asymptomatic.

“I talked to Public Health and they said the employees should all remain isolation until December 7, and as long as they don’t develop symptoms they can come back to work.

“I will be working in store myself today and tomorrow and I am bringing in outside people to work for the rest of the week,” said Gajar. “I have been in touch with Public Health and we are following their protocols.”

The Subway employee who tested positive lives in the same house with two employees of the Sharbot Lake Ultramar/Square Boy Pizza store, which is located near the Subway store.

One of those employees works in the Square Boy take-out restaurant, which is co-located with the store. He went into isolation as soon as he heard about his apartment-mates test, and he has since tested negative for COVID.

The other employee has been off work from Wednesday of last week. He was off on pre-planned vacation days, and has not been back to work yet.

Hina Shah, who owns the Ultramar/Square Boy Franchises with her husband Dharmesh, arrived with her son on Thursday, (November 26) to work in the store. Hina and her son have not been exposed to the other employees because they have been working alone in the store since then. Dharmesh came on the weekend. Whlie the gas bar and convenience store have remained open, the Square Boy has been closed since Wednesday.

“We spent a lot of time on the weekend, cleaning and dis-infecting everything, the bathroom, all the surfaces and the pizza area,” Shah said on Monday, in a telephone interview.

“I have not talked to the Ultramar employee, but I know he has been tested. I don’t know the results of the test, but he is in isolation. I will be talking to him later today.”

Hina Shah said that they are hoping to open the Square Boy on Wednesday evening or Thursday if they can find a replacement employee and are working with Square Boy to try and find someone to work.

The gas bar and convenience store remain open. People can pay at the pump for gas or enter the store to pay.

According to Kingston, Frontenac, Lennox and Addington Public Health (KFLAPH), the “timeline for return to work depend on if an individual is a close contact of a positive case or a positive case. For a positive case: Individuals must isolate for 10 days from symptom onset or positive test result. For a close contact of a positive case (identified and contacted by KFL&A Public Health): The individual must isolate for 14 days from the last day of contact with the positive case.”

The protocol for restaurant cleaning is posted on the KFLAPH website (Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19): Cleaning and Disinfection for Public Settings (publichealthontario.ca)