Walmart has temporarily closed it Northeast Philadelphia location so it can be sanitized by a third-party cleaner amid the surge in COVID-19 infections.
The store, located at 2200 Wheatsheaf Lane in the Aramingo Crossings shopping mall, will reopen at 6 a.m. Sunday. It also will be restocked during the closure.
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Walmart has closed dozens of its stores nationwide in recent days, including some in Texas and Florida, as the omicron variant floods the nation. The flurry of January closures follow the decision to temporarily close 60 stores last month.
Earlier this week, the chain's other Philadelphia store, located off Columbus Boulevard, and its Williamstown, New Jersey location, temporarily closed. They reopened Thursday morning.
The closures are part of an "ongoing company-initiated program" due to the spike in COVID-19 cases, spokesperson Ashley Nolan said.
"Everything we're doing is for the well-being of our associates and the thousands of customers we serve daily," Nolan said.
All closures are being made on a store-by-store basis, Nolan said. She did not provide a list of all the Walmart stores being closed nationwide but said the Northeast Philly store is the only one in the region currently slated for a temporary closure.
Walmart will continue to require employees and customers to wear masks in counties that the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention has determined to have high transmission rates, Nolan said. That currently includes almost every county in the nation.
There are 1,215 people hospitalized with COVID-19 in Philadelphia, more than double the 507 people hospitalized on New Year's Eve, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Health's COVID-19 dashboard. The city's new daily cases have jumped from 214 on Dec. 5 to 5,516 Thursday.
Although the stores in Northeast and South Philly are the only standard Walmarts within Philadelphia, there are also two Walmart-brand Neighborhood Market grocery stores in Garden Court and Frankford sections of the city.