Two of Kent's largest department stores are to close from tomorrow evening amid the coronavirus outbreak.

Fenwick in Whitefriars, Canterbury and Victoria Road, Tunbridge Wells will shut its doors from 6pm.

The store said it 'went against everything in its nature' to close to shoppers.

But it added: "The doors of Fenwick have been open to customers for almost 140 years ... but these aren't normal times.

"As a family business, the health and wellbeing of our customers, our teams and our local communities is always close to our heart and in these times of great uncertainty we need to do the right thing for them by mitigating the potential spread of the virus.

"We have therefore taken the very difficult decision to temporarily close all Fenwick stores to the public from 6pm on Thursday until further notice."

It comes on another traumatic day in the coronavirus crisis, with the Government earlier annoucing that all schools would close after Friday until further notice.