Indoor dining expected to be allowed in Chicago starting Saturday

Customers will be allowed back inside of bars and restaurants in Chicago and suburban Cook County beginning Saturday, provided coronavirus infection rates stay down.

The city and Cook County will move from Tier 2 to Tier 1 of Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s COVID-19 mitigation plan as long as metrics continue to improve or stay the same, according to the Illinois Department of Public Health.

Tier 1 mitigations allow bars and restaurants to seat customers inside at the lesser of 25% capacity or 25 people per room.

"With all regions of Illinois now out of Tier 3, we can now see that the entire state is headed down the right path," IDPH Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike said in a statement. "During the summer, we were on this same path. We know that we must continue to take precautions and be smart about how we relax some of the mitigation measures, which are in place to protect our health and safety."