Coronavirus update: Safety tips for food delivery amid COVID-19 pandemic

NEW YORK -- Many of us will be looking to take a break from cooking, but aren't sure if it's a good idea to order takeout.

In the age of coronavirus: is it safe to get delivery?

Dr. Simone Wildes, an infectious disease specialist says - order away. Her guidance?

"No contact with the delivery person," Dr. Wildes said.

Tell the delivery person it's OK to leave the food at the door.

"Contact-less delivery is to leave the food in the package or the food outside without having to directly speak with the person or individuals. And then they go out and collect the packages without any direct interaction," Dr. Wildes said.

Once you get the food inside, she suggests a slightly different protocol.

"You take it out of the containers. Toss those containers and wash your hands thoroughly with soap and water," Dr. Wildes said.

With the National Institutes of Health releasing info this week that coronavirus can live on cardboard for 24 hours and plastic surfaces for up to 72 hours, disposing of the packaging and washing your hands makes sense.

And protecting delivery people is important too.

"Good Morning America" talked to CEOs of the two largest food delivery services, DoorDash and Grubhub, to see what precautions they are taking.

"For drivers, we are in the middle of distributing over a million health kits, which include gloves and sanitizers," said Tony Xu, CEO and co-founder of DoorDash. "For consumers, this week we are defaulting all deliveries to no contact."

"We're working really hard with local jurisdictions to make sure that delivery and pickup is still available," Matt Maloney, founder and CEO of Grubhub, added.

But what about the food itself? The CDC advises that "currently, there is no evidence to support transmission of COVID-19 associated with food."