Cedar Creek Lake’s business community is scrambling to comply with Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s March 19, 2020, executive order aimed at helping curb the coronavirus epidemic.

There currently are no recorded cases of COVID-19 in the Cedar Creek Lake area, but medical experts warn the epidemic is being spread statewide by people who are infected but not showing any symptoms.

The statewide action shuts down restaurant dining rooms, bars, gyms, theaters, bingo parlors and other non-essential businesses from March 21 to April 3. It also closes schools and forbids visits to nursing homes, unless the patients are in critical care.

Gatherings of more than 10 people are banned in social settings.

Restaurants will be allowed to operate drive-through service and fill indoor take-out orders. Alcohol can also be sold for take-out with food orders as part of a special provision of the mandate.

Many of Cedar Creek Lake restaurants are planning on operating take-out services during the closures of their dining rooms, but the emergency measure will take a toll on employees such as servers who will not be able to work.

(Workers who are laid off temporarily without pay due to a reduction in business activity can apply for a COVID-19 Pandemic Unemployment Payment. This new payment quickly delivers income support to the unemployed for a six-week period, no matter whether they are self-employed or employees. Visit the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection at www.mywelfare.ie)

The manager of Papa’s Cafeteria in Seven Points said take-out service would continue during the dining room closure. She noted that business had already fallen off sharply over the past week. “People are really scared,” she said.

Several chain food operations on the lake, such as McDonald’s, Church’s and Jack in the Box, had already ceased dining room service before the governor’s announcement.

Walmart and Brookshire’s grocery stores are experiencing heavy traffic, and many shelves, such as those for milk, bread, eggs and meat and paper products, are bare as residents rush to stock up on supplies.

Government offices have also closed, and county jails are not allowing inmates to receive visitors. Lake cities and counties are declaring states of emergency following similar national and state declarations.

The governor said during his press conference he took the action because of warnings by epidemiologists that the number of COVID-19 cases in Texas — reported now by the Department of State Health Services to be 194 with five deaths as of 3 p.m. March 20 — could skyrocket to tens of thousands in two weeks.

The U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention reports that there are now 15,219 cases with 201 deaths in the nation. The recording of coronavirus cases began Jan. 21, 2020.