Hussain, dressed in his signature thin-knit black turtleneck and carrying a water bottle marked with the logo of Batman, says he knew even in January of last year that the coronavirus was going to take a devastating toll on the industry. He quickly drew up a playbook of safety protocols, which he distributed freely to restaurants around the world, an example of restaurateurs banding together that was hailed by international media including CNN and
The New York Times. That a man with a self-avowed desire to save the world would wind up contracting the virus was a cruel irony, particularly for someone who had worked so hard to keep businesses open and his financially strapped workers employed successfully thus far.