Two recent health advisories from Saskatchewan businesses due to COVID-19 have led to questions about what businesses' responsibilities are if a case appears.

What are the procedures in place? Does that business have to close its doors yet again?

There have been two such cases in recent days, both in licensed establishments; the first in Emma Lake and the second in Saskatoon. Both prompted advisories from the SHA after an employee tested positive for the virus.

When asked the question during his most recent press conference, Saskatchewan's Chief Medical Health Officer, Dr. Saqib Shahab, largely dismissed the notion of a business needing to close.

"Proper steps may include cleaning. Generally, closing a business is not required or taken. But certainly, generally, we know that the virus may live on a surface that can be cleaned very quickly and that's not really the setting in which transmission happens."

There are different protocols for different levels of risk, and different factors involved.

"For example, if someone was not at work while symptomatic, there's no issue for any case contact or follow up at the place of work. If someone was working in an area where there were just a few other employees, routinely there is an assessment made where all employees or only some were close contacts."

He added that in the event that there was no way to track the number of potential contacts, as was the case with both Emma Lake or the latest in Saskatoon, a public health advisory is released.

Despite the warning, however, he says that they don't see much transmission in retail environments.

"Transmission is a function of how close you are to someone. How long you are close to that person. For example in a social setting at home around food and drink. So those are the settings where transmission risk is higher. So if you just pass by someone even closer than two metres, the risk of transmission in those settings is much lower."

View the full statement below.