Customers, employees required to wear masks inside essential businesses

FOX 29's Jennifer Joyce has the latest.

PHILADELPHIA - Employees and shoppers are now required to wear masks at essential businesses across Pennsylvania. The order, handed down by Gov. Tom Wolf last week, kicked into effect at 8 p.m. Sunday.

The order states that a business can deny entry to anyone who refuses without a medically valid reason.

The mask mandate was included in a wide-ranging order that will govern many aspects of how a business operates — from how it arranges its break room to how many patrons it can allow inside at any one time — as the administration of Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf confronts a pandemic that has killed at least 647 in Pennsylvania and sickened thousands more.

“Our essential workers have stepped up to the plate and are keeping us safe, healthy, fed and sheltered during this time, and we all need to thank them (by) doing everything we can to prevent ourselves from spreading the virus to them,” Gov. Wolf said at a video news conference.

Before the 8 p.m. mandate, some stores in Philadelphia were still letting customers inside without a mask.

Now, any store that allows shoppers inside without a mask will be issued a warning by state officials, and become subject to further citations.