Apple's Response to Covid-19
Covid-19 has become a global pandemic. Many companies, states, and other local governments are taking extraordinary steps to help curb the infection rate. The state of Illinois is going to great lengths by closing all schools for two weeks. Many companies are cancelling large gathering and having their staff work from home for extended periods of time. Apple is no exception. To quote Apple
We will be closing all of our retail stores outside of Greater China until March 27. We are committed to providing exceptional service to our customers.
The note from Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook continues:
In all of our offices, we are moving to flexible work arrangements worldwide outside of Greater China. That means team members should work remotely if their job allows, and those whose work requires them to be on site should follow guidance to maximize interpersonal space. Extensive, deep cleaning will continue at all sites. In all our offices, we are rolling out new health screenings and temperature checks.
All of our hourly workers will continue to receive pay in alignment with business as usual operations. We have expanded our leave policies to accommodate personal or family health circumstances created by COVID-19 — including recovering from an illness, caring for a sick loved one, mandatory quarantining, or childcare challenges due to school closures.
Lastly,
Apple’s committed donations to the global COVID-19 response — both to help treat those who are sick and to help lessen the economic and community impacts of the pandemic — today reached $15 million worldwide.
We’re also announcing that we are matching our employee donations two-to-one to support COVID-19 response efforts locally, nationally and internationally.
Apple closing its stores is no real surprise. They did the same thing in China during the height of its infection, so it would make sense to do the same in other parts of the world. It is also good to see Apple donating money to help those affected by the virus, as well as continuing to pay hourly workers.
Source: Apple