MARGAO
After a gap of two months, fitness enthusiasts can rejoice as gyms have been allowed to reopen, albeit with precautions to ensure the safety of the clients.
Many gyms in the state have started sanitising and changing their plan of action to enable safe workouts for the users. According to Vishnu Uskikar, secretary of All Goa Gyms Owners Association said the safety will be ensured through sanitisation of the entire gym premises, apart from ensuring that clients follow health protocols.
“We mandatorily check temperature and oxygen levels before clients enter the gym and we also have put up touch-free sanitisers at the entrance and sprays at every machine. In addition to this, we are also fumigating the premises thrice every day,” said Uskikar. “I would suggest the same to every gym owner, especially allocating time slots for clients and avoiding partner workouts.”
Echoing the same, Govind Lotlikar, a member of the association and the owner of Infinity Gyms in Margao, said, “In addition to sanitising, we will also ensure limited people at the premises by allocating them time-slots. We have also requested clients to let us know if they wish to change their time slots to ensure the number of people remains the same,” Lotlikar said. “The safety schedule also includes sanitising every machine after every time slot.
“As of now we are expecting about 50 per cent of users and we hope our clients spread the word about the safety measures. We are preparing for a footfall increase in a couple of months,” Lotlikar added.
He thanked Chief Minister Dr Pramod Sawant for allowing fitness centres to run at 50 per cent capacity after having appraised him about how gyms had been suffering because of the closure of business due to the pandemic when a delegation met the CM at his Sanquelim residence recently.
According to the government, the management of gyms is bound by adherence to precautionary measures and preventive measures set by the Ministry of Public Health and they must follow the following guidelines: The number of clients should not exceed the allowed occupancy rate during the current period; clients should be allowed to enter only after checking green status; examine the temperature of customers at entrances and do not allow individuals whose temperature exceeds 38 degree Celsius; providing hand sanitisers and soap in all gym facilities; requiring customers to book in advance and preventing them from waiting and gathering inside spas and salons; requiring employees and clients to leave a distance of not less than two metres between them.
