British Columbia’s casinos will be shutting their doors to the public starting on Tuesday.

The BCLC has confirmed that all casinos, community gaming centres and bingo halls across the province will close because of the COVID-19 outbreak.

The process is expected to be complete by 11:59 pm today.

Casinos in BC are operated privately, but under a contract with BCLC.

The gaming corporation said that a directive to take these measures was likely imminent, so the industry came to a consensus to suspend operations.

“BCLC put the health of players, employees and communities at the forefront and took measures over the last number of days,” said a media release. 

“Most recently, the industry had been phasing in a reduction of service, creating greater social distance in the casinos by turning off every second slot machine, removing seats at table games and stopping all casino marketing.”

Facilities will reopen when BCLC receives government direction that it’s safe and appropriate to do so.