A restaurant has temporarily closed after a person who was on site at the weekend tested positive for Covid-19.

After receiving the news that the individual - who was in Pasha Restaurant and Lounge, Billericay High Street, on Saturday - had received a positive result, bosses have closed their doors while they wait for negative test results from all staff members and a deep clean to take place.

Although the team believe the risk to be very minimal, the Turkish restaurant will be closed for a minimum 72 hour period and is expected to re-open within a few days.

Bosses are now working to contact everyone who dined at the restaurant on Saturday and have thanked everyone for their patience and support.

It is however yet to be confirmed whether the positive case was a staff member or a customer.

Paula Eccles, general manager at the restaurant, revealed the news late Monday evening.

She said: "At Pasha Restaurant & Lounge we pride ourselves on putting our customers first. With it being very late in the evening we wanted to get this message out as quickly as possible.

"Someone who was in Pasha on Saturday September 26 has sadly tested positive for Covid-19. As such we have made the decision to temporarily close our doors until we can confirm negative test results for all staff members.

"We take our responsibility to you and our staff very seriously and do not want to put anyone at unnecessary risk. We hope you understand that until we know there is no risk we have to do the right thing.

"If you were a diner on Saturday you will receive a phone call tomorrow to advise you of this aswell.

"We feel the risk is very minimal given the preventative measures we have in place however, please follow all official government guidance and if you are contacted by NHS Track and Trace to advise you to self isolate please do so."

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In yesterday's update on their Facebook page, the team posted: "We will be contacting everyone who dined with us on Saturday to inform in detail and provide a clear breakdown of our findings to give as much reassurance as possible.

"In the meantime we will be closed for a minimum 72 hour period as per government guidelines.

"We will have a professional company in to deep clean every inch of the restaurant who specialise in this field (bio covid fog clean) to add further confidence to our Covid strategies we already have in place.

"We hope to be open within a few days to honour all of our bookings and we thank you all for your patience and support."