All Bars, Restaurants Closed in Illinois and Ohio

The March 2020 announcement that Governor J.B. Pritzker of Illinois and Governor Mike DeWine of Ohio were ordering bars and restaurants to close — limiting them initially to carry-out and delivery service — was one of the early concrete manifestations of the COVID-19 pandemic's arrival in the United States as a public health emergency requiring immediate, dramatic action. (Ohio's order came March 15; Illinois followed on March 16.)

The orders, announced within days of each other in mid-March 2020, came as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the White House coronavirus task force were issuing guidance about reducing gatherings and social distancing. Restaurant and bar closures were among the most visible and economically significant measures available to state governors acting within their emergency powers, targeting the indoor gatherings and close-proximity interactions that infectious-disease specialists identified as high-risk environments for viral transmission.

The economic impact was immediate and severe. The restaurant industry was one of the largest employers in both states and nationally, with millions of workers — disproportionately from lower-income backgrounds, often without significant savings or access to traditional employment benefits — suddenly facing loss of income. The federal government's initial response through the CARES Act and subsequent legislation attempted to provide emergency relief, but the rollout was uneven and the scale of need exceeded available resources.

For the businesses themselves, forced closure without a clear timeline created existential uncertainty. Many restaurants and bars never reopened — the National Restaurant Association estimated that more than 100,000 U.S. restaurants had permanently closed by the end of 2020.

The closure orders were public health decisions made in the early weeks of a rapidly evolving emergency, when uncertainty about the virus was extreme and the precautionary instinct pointed toward maximum restriction.

Originally published March 2020; lightly updated.