Unlike their competitors, Best Buy has not decided to close their stores temporarily to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Best Buy employees touch customers’ phones, a prime vector for disease transmission. Best Buy is requiring that their employees come in as usual, and not even offering a special accommodation for those who catch the virus. (They’re being instructed to use their accrued paid time off.)





Apple closed all their retail stores outside of China until March 23. (Stores in China were closed when the disease was spreading there.)

If Best Buy employees get sick, they will inevitably spread the disease to their friends, family, and others in the community. People who are over age 60, those with autoimmune disorders, or those, like myself, with asthma, are hit much harder by the disease. Despite our best efforts to avoid the disease, we will be exposed to it through our friends, family, and roommates who we live with. Best Buy is demonstrating that they care more about profiting from people panic buying than they do protecting their community’s health.

Best Buy’s corporate employees, no doubt, are working from home, but they don’t respect their retail workers enough to take them out of harm’s way. Their retail workers cannot afford to jeopardize their jobs, so they have no choice but to expose themselves to disease.





For more information, see: https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/y3mkvx/best-buy-working-full-capacity-coronavirus-risks