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Chipotle staff can call nurse to prove they’re not just hungover

Chipotle Mexican Grill gets sick employees to call a nurse — to prove they’re not just hung over, the company’s CEO has revealed.

“We have nurses on call, so that if you say, ‘Hey, I’ve been sick,’ you get the call into the nurse,” CEO Brian Niccol told a conference Wednesday, according to Business Insider.

“The nurse validates that it’s not a hangover — you’re really sick — and then we pay for the day off to get healthy again.”

A spokeswoman later insisted that it was a voluntary service, and not one enforced to catch out staff.

“You don’t have to call a nurse if you’re taking a sick day,” she stressed, adding, “All employees who call off sick for any reason receive paid time off.”





Niccol said the calls were part of the Mexican restaurant chain’s strict new safety practices following a series of health scares, including a norovirus outbreak among customers in Virginia in 2017 caused by just one sick employee coming to work.

“We have a very different food-safety culture than we did two years ago, OK?” Niccol told the conference, according to the report.

“Nobody gets to the back of the restaurant without going through a wellness check.”

He said the chain has to “hold ourselves to a higher standard to make sure that the dining room gets sanitized in a way that it hasn’t been in the past,” according to the report.

“We’ve got cleaner that actually kills norovirus when you clean the tables in the dining room,” Niccol said of one improvement.





Kerry Bridges, Chipotle’s vice president of food safety, said Thursday that food safety is “part of our culture” with “industry-leading initiatives” to improve standards.

“Like other food establishments, Chipotle has partnered with Zero Hour Health since 2008 to provide trained health care professionals who consult with employees who may feel ill,” she said of her CEO’s comments.





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