Despite no recorded cases, Bali tourism still catches cold from COVID-19 outbreak

6 Mar 2020 16:26:26

thejakartapost.com

When Ketut Suarsa Dipa, 41, heard about an outbreak caused by a new strain of coronavirus in China in January, he was not particularly concerned.

But as the virus, later called SARS-CoV-2 which causes the COVID-19 disease, spread fast across the globe and dramatically reduced the number of foreign tourists coming to Bali, the freelance driver began to worry about whether he would earn enough for his family and perhaps even the possibility of getting infected himself.

“Many customers have decided to cancel their trips to Bali. Most of them say that they decided to stay at home, because of worries about the virus,” said Suarsa, who is a father of three.

The Bali Immigration Office recorded 392,824 tourists arriving in February, a 33 percent drop from January, after the government imposed travel bans to and from mainland China on Feb. 5 to curb the spread of the outbreak. Australians replaced Chinese as the biggest number of foreign tourists last month, followed by India and Japan.

Read full story: thejakartapost.com