Toronto’s mayor says with the rising number of COVID-19 cases in the city, we all need to scale back our social interactions to the way we were conducting ourselves back in the spring.
John Tory says he’s following the advice of Toronto’s chief medical officer of health and recommending to city councillors a new list of restrictions.
“They include, strongly recommending that people limit interactions outside their home and wear a mask as much as possible, extending for six months our mandatory mask bylaws that apply to public areas and businesses like stores and common areas in apartments and condos, urging the provincial government through the Ministry of Labour to introduce mandatory mask policies inside workplaces where physical distancing isn’t possible,” Tory outlined.
The recommendations come in the wake of Monday’s record 381 new cases of COVID-19 in Toronto over a single 24-hour period.

Dr. Eileen de Villa is also recommending city council implement a number of new rules for restaurants to curb the spread of COVID-19.
These include reducing the number of patrons in a bar or restaurant to 75 from 100, limiting the number of guests per table to 6 from 10, making it mandatory to collect contact information from each patron and for the level of music to be no louder than normal conversation.
“Risk of transmission is also heightened when one has to raise one’s voice in order to speak, and with loud music or a noisy environment, people tend to lean in and to speak more loudly therefore increasing the risk of potential virus transmission,” Dr. de Villa explained.
Lowering background noise and music in restaurants is something Moses Znaimer’s Anti-Noise Pollution League has wanted for years, long before the pandemic.