SHOPPING malls have continued to flourish despite the rise of e-commerce and a glut of such places in the country.
Malls in this region have done well by incorporating entertainment and dining to offer more than retail.
They grew into venues where families and friends could spend time together, and this has helped to maintain a strong mall culture.
Consumer goods are still mainly moved through traditional retail, with brick-and-mortar outlets chalking up the bulk of the sales.
However, the Covid-19 pandemic is now threatening their business operations. There were 105 new cases registered under the Utama cluster last Friday.
The recent scare has led to Klang Valley residents staying away from shopping malls, leading to a drop in footfall. This translates to lower sale transactions and a dip in earnings for traders in these places.
The index case for the Utama cluster is a 28-year-old Nepalese security guard at one of the shopping malls in the Petaling district, Health Director-General Tan Sri Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said.
Malls have to be proactive in ensuring public confidence in their facilities. It would make sense to ensure that their frontline staff are periodically checked for Covid-19.
Imagine how big the risk of exposure an affected security guard would pose to shoppers. If the guard had been placed at the main entrance and was tasked with taking the temperature of visitors, he would have come into close contact with thousands of people in a day.
What some retail outlets are now doing is putting up a self-check electronic thermometer. That way, their staff do not have to put themselves or others at risk of infection.
Beyond the human vector, Covid-19 can spread through common contact areas such as door handles, lift buttons, ATM keypads, escalator handrails, shopping trolleys and parking ticket payment machines, among others.
The virus can survive on surfaces longer than initially thought. Disinfection of such contact points should be stepped up and the practice of supplying plastic gloves to customers by a grocery chain should be emulated by other retailers that do not do so.
Such practices should also be employed for frontline staff or counter clerks who would face a big number of people daily. The operation areas can also do with similar regular disinfection or cleaning up.
