Coronavirus: Pubs and restaurants seeing business plummet

One of Britain’s biggest and highest-profiile food and pub chains has said that sales are “getting worse by the day” following the impact of coronavirus.

Wagamama-owner The Restaurant Group, which also runs several pub-restaurants across the country, said that like-for-like sales were down 12.5% in the last two weeks.

It was joined this morning (Wednesday) by Marston’s, which runs 1,400 pubs and warned that Government advice to avoid eating or drinking out would cause “significantly lower sales in the coming weeks”.

.Mitchells & Butler, owner of Toby Carvery and All Bar One, warned that “recent trading has been severely impacted” by coronavirus, adding that the Government’s advice to stay home “is now expected to lead to a further significant downturn in sales”.

Mitchells & Butler said it was “encouraged” by the Chancellor’s statements, and The Restaurant Group said it was building the rates relief into its forecasts for the next year.

And the boss of Superdry has warned of a “fluid and uncertain” situation after it closed 78 stores across Europe as governments force high streets to close to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

Meanwhile, McDonald’s has today confirmed that from 5am this morning, all restaurants in the UK and Ireland will close seating areas.

The fast-food restaurant will temporarily move to being takeaway, drive-thru and delivery operations only.

In today's most shocking personal story, a nine-month-old baby boy from Manchester is believed to be the second baby to contract coronavirus in the UK.

Cassian Coates suffered from a fever and a cold for several days.

His concerned parents Myroslava and Callum took him to hospital where he was diagnosed with coronavirus, despite neither of them having shown any symptoms.

The family are now all self-isolating at their home.

Cassian is being treated with Calpol as if he was suffering with a cold.

Myroslava has said that she did not think the guidelines had been clear enough, and that after they posted the news of Cassian's positive test on social media they had been inundated with questions from other parents.

She said: "There are peaks and troughs but thankfully Cassian is over the worst of it."

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