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El Paso bars celebrate St. Patrick’s day during pandemic

El Paso bars prepare for St. Patrick's day celebration during pandemic

El Paso, Texas -- It was exactly one year ago when El Paso's health chief, Dr. Hector Ocaranza, ordered bars to shut down amid Covid-19 concerns.

"We were ready for a big day. Waking up and hearing the news that we had to close down was hard for us and a lot of bars also," said Asher Mercado, general manager of Hope and Anchor.

Last year’s bar shut down impacted his business in more ways than one.

"We bought green beer that’s only good for St. Patty’s day and it was kind of detrimental because we spent so much money and then we closed for several months. And had we known we wouldn't of bought the product,” said Mercado.

Fast forward to one year later and even though the Borderland is still not out of the woods from the pandemic, bars like Hope and Anchor are back open for a busy St. Patrick's Day celebration as it will be the first holiday of sorts to be celebrated in El Paso since the start of the pandemic.

"We’re ready for a big crowd but we also just want people to feel safe here,” said Mercado.

Earlier this month, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott lifted the mask mandate and allowed businesses to operate at 100% capacity, but local bars like Hope and Anchor will still be implementing face mask requirements as well as social distancing guidelines.

"We’re still enforcing masks. It's part of our dress code," explained Mercado, "We’re still doing a limited capacity and we have hand sanitizer all over the place so we can be as safe as possible for our guests and for the staff, because they're risking themselves by coming to work and we want the best possible environment made for them as well.”

To encourage customers to wear a mask, Mercado and his staff decided to have a face mask contest.

"We wanted to do something different for the holiday. It was an anniversary for us and for every bar and there’s a lot of cool masks out there so we wanted people to do like macaroni art, put glitter on their masks and all that fun stuff," said Mercado.

"We’d love to go back to no masks and having this place be crowded again but we want everyone to be safe before anything else,” Mercado added.

Health officials are urging locals to continue taking safety precautions if heading out to a bar.

Although cases are seemingly decreasing for some states, the new challenge many Americans have to face now is the spread of highly contagious Coronavirus variants.

One of those variants, the B.1.1.7 strain, was first detected in the United Kingdom but has already spread to at least 48 U.S. states, as well as Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico.

Research shows that in the U.S., the variant is 59% to 74% more transmissible than the original novel coronavirus.

And new research suggests the B.1.1.7 strain isn’t just more contagious — it could also be deadlier.

Article Topic Follows: El Paso

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Iris Lopez

Iris Lopez is a weathercaster and reporter for ABC-7.

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