The Over-Reaction to SARS and the Collapse of Asian Tourism
Identifieur interne : 000935 ( Pmc/Corpus ); précédent : 000934; suivant : 000936The Over-Reaction to SARS and the Collapse of Asian Tourism
Auteurs : Bob Mckercher ; Kaye ChonSource :
- Annals of Tourism Research [ 0160-7383 ] ; 2004.
Url:
DOI: 10.1016/j.annals.2003.11.002
PubMed: NONE
PubMed Central: 7148758
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<record><TEI><teiHeader><fileDesc><titleStmt><title xml:lang="en">The Over-Reaction to SARS and the Collapse of Asian Tourism</title><author><name sortKey="Mckercher, Bob" sort="Mckercher, Bob" uniqKey="Mckercher B" first="Bob" last="Mckercher">Bob Mckercher</name></author><author><name sortKey="Chon, Kaye" sort="Chon, Kaye" uniqKey="Chon K" first="Kaye" last="Chon">Kaye Chon</name></author></titleStmt><publicationStmt><idno type="wicri:source">PMC</idno><idno type="pmc">7148758</idno><idno type="url">http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7148758</idno><idno type="RBID">PMC:7148758</idno><idno type="doi">10.1016/j.annals.2003.11.002</idno><idno type="pmid">NONE</idno><date when="2004">2004</date><idno type="wicri:Area/Pmc/Corpus">000935</idno><idno type="wicri:explorRef" wicri:stream="Pmc" wicri:step="Corpus" wicri:corpus="PMC">000935</idno></publicationStmt><sourceDesc><biblStruct><analytic><title xml:lang="en" level="a" type="main">The Over-Reaction to SARS and the Collapse of Asian Tourism</title><author><name sortKey="Mckercher, Bob" sort="Mckercher, Bob" uniqKey="Mckercher B" first="Bob" last="Mckercher">Bob Mckercher</name></author><author><name sortKey="Chon, Kaye" sort="Chon, Kaye" uniqKey="Chon K" first="Kaye" last="Chon">Kaye Chon</name></author></analytic><series><title level="j">Annals of Tourism Research</title><idno type="ISSN">0160-7383</idno><idno type="eISSN">0160-7383</idno><imprint><date when="2004">2004</date></imprint></series></biblStruct></sourceDesc></fileDesc><profileDesc><textClass></textClass></profileDesc></teiHeader><back><div1 type="bibliography"><listBibl><biblStruct></biblStruct><biblStruct></biblStruct><biblStruct></biblStruct><biblStruct></biblStruct><biblStruct></biblStruct><biblStruct></biblStruct><biblStruct></biblStruct><biblStruct><analytic><author><name sortKey="Rodriguez Garcia, R" uniqKey="Rodriguez Garcia R">R Rodriguez-Garcia</name></author></analytic></biblStruct><biblStruct></biblStruct><biblStruct></biblStruct><biblStruct></biblStruct><biblStruct></biblStruct></listBibl></div1></back></TEI><pmc article-type="brief-report"><pmc-dir>properties open_access</pmc-dir>
<front><journal-meta><journal-title-group><journal-title>Annals of Tourism Research</journal-title></journal-title-group><issn pub-type="ppub">0160-7383</issn><issn pub-type="epub">0160-7383</issn><publisher><publisher-name>Elsevier Ltd.</publisher-name></publisher></journal-meta><article-meta><article-id pub-id-type="pmc">7148758</article-id><article-id pub-id-type="publisher-id">S0160-7383(04)00028-3</article-id><article-id pub-id-type="doi">10.1016/j.annals.2003.11.002</article-id><article-categories><subj-group subj-group-type="heading"><subject>Article</subject></subj-group></article-categories><title-group><article-title>The Over-Reaction to SARS and the Collapse of Asian Tourism</article-title></title-group><contrib-group><contrib contrib-type="author"><name><surname>McKercher</surname><given-names>Bob</given-names></name></contrib><contrib contrib-type="author"><name><surname>Chon</surname><given-names>Kaye</given-names></name></contrib></contrib-group><aff>Hong Kong Polytechnic University, China</aff><pub-date pub-type="pmc-release"><day>25</day><month>5</month><year>2004</year></pub-date><pmc-comment> PMC Release delay is 0 months and 0 days and was based on .</pmc-comment>
<pub-date pub-type="ppub"><month>7</month><year>2004</year></pub-date><pub-date pub-type="epub"><day>25</day><month>5</month><year>2004</year></pub-date><volume>31</volume><issue>3</issue><fpage>716</fpage><lpage>719</lpage><history><date date-type="received"><day>28</day><month>5</month><year>2003</year></date><date date-type="rev-recd"><day>10</day><month>10</month><year>2003</year></date><date date-type="rev-recd"><day>31</day><month>10</month><year>2003</year></date><date date-type="rev-recd"><day>20</day><month>11</month><year>2003</year></date><date date-type="accepted"><day>4</day><month>12</month><year>2003</year></date></history><permissions><copyright-statement>Copyright © 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.</copyright-statement><copyright-year>2004</copyright-year><copyright-holder>Elsevier Ltd</copyright-holder><license><license-p>Since January 2020 Elsevier has created a COVID-19 resource centre with free information in English and Mandarin on the novel coronavirus COVID-19. The COVID-19 resource centre is hosted on Elsevier Connect, the company's public news and information website. Elsevier hereby grants permission to make all its COVID-19-related research that is available on the COVID-19 resource centre - including this research content - immediately available in PubMed Central and other publicly funded repositories, such as the WHO COVID database with rights for unrestricted research re-use and analyses in any form or by any means with acknowledgement of the original source. These permissions are granted for free by Elsevier for as long as the COVID-19 resource centre remains active.</license-p></license></permissions></article-meta></front><body><p>The 2003 Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak devastated Asian tourism. The World Travel and Tourism Council (<xref rid="BIB12" ref-type="bibr">WTTC 2003</xref>) estimated that up to three million people in the industry lost their jobs in the most severely affected jurisdictions of China, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Vietnam and that the outbreak cost these four economies over $20 billion in lost GDP. Tourism arrivals also fell by 70% or more across the rest of Asia, even in countries that were largely or totally disease-free. The cause of this regionwide tourism collapse can be attributed more to how governments reacted to the perceived threat of the disease rather than to the real public health danger posed. This research note presents a cautionary tale about transnational crises and how over-reaction, lack of coordination and well-meaning (but ultimately misguided) actions can affect tourism flows. The analysis of the events is suggested to form the justification for new research into national recovery strategies.</p><p>Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome or atypical pneumonia is a new disease that was identified first in southern China. The world became aware of it in March 2003 when a tourist in Hong Kong infected a number of people staying at the same hotel. Seven of the infected guests returned to their homes in Canada, Vietnam, and Singapore, introducing the disease there. Globally, media soon after reported that a new, virulent epidemic was being disseminated by returning tourists. While tourism is well known in the medical community to be a vector for disease dissemination (<xref rid="BIB8" ref-type="bibr">Rodriguez-Garcia 2001</xref>), SARS represented a stark example of an explicit link between travel and the global spread of an illness. A hotel was identified as “ground zero” with the hotel’s name publicized widely (<xref rid="BIB2" ref-type="bibr">CNN 2003</xref>, <xref rid="BIB4" ref-type="bibr">Fox 2003</xref>). Media coverage of airline passengers falling ill (<xref rid="BIB5" ref-type="bibr">Frith 2003</xref>) further established a link with tourism, as did a variety of subsequent print and electronic media reports, too numerous to summarize here.</p><p>While one Harvard academic suggested that 75% of the world’s population would have been infected had nothing been done to halt the disease (<xref rid="BIB1" ref-type="bibr">Benitez 2003</xref>), prompt action from the World Health Organization ensured that SARS did not become the plague that many predicted. In the end, about 8100 people worldwide were infected, with 97.7% of all cases occurring in Hong Kong, China, Taiwan Province, Singapore, and Canada. Fewer than 750 died, again with 98.3% of fatalities confined to these five jurisdictions (<xref rid="BIB10" ref-type="bibr">WHO 2003a</xref>). The mode of transmission was identified quickly and within a short period of time, the medical profession realized that the risk to the general population was minimal. In fact, measles is considered to be five times more infectious than SARS (<xref rid="BIB1" ref-type="bibr">Benitez 2003</xref>).</p><p>This insight suggests that SARS should have had no more impact on global tourism than any other seasonal influenza outbreak. Instead, the issuance of a WHO “general travel advisory” on March 15, 2003, triggered a chain reaction of responses. A series of specific travel advisories against Hong Kong, China, Toronto, and Taiwan effectively closed many borders. The WHO announcements were unprecedented in its almost 45-year history, for this was the first time that the organization had issued advisories for specific geographical areas because of an outbreak of an infectious disease (<xref rid="BIB12" ref-type="bibr">WTTC 2003</xref>). The Thai government ordered tourists from affected areas to wear facemasks for the entire duration of their visit or face up to six months imprisonment. It also warned that if one arriving passenger showed SARS-like symptoms, all passengers would be quarantined for two weeks (<xref rid="BIB9" ref-type="bibr">Shamdasani 2003</xref>). Malaysia issued a travel ban on all tourists from SARS-infected countries. A number of cities in China issued similar travel bans that were subsequently lifted. Singapore imposed an automatic 14-day quarantine period on returning residents who visited infected countries. Taiwan imposed a 14-day quarantine period on incoming passengers. Media reports suggested that Asian tourists were denied entry to trade shows, hotels, and cruiseships and that some countries stopped issuing visas. At the peak of the outbreak, more than 110 countries placed some type of travel restrictions on Mainland Chinese tourists (<xref rid="BIB3" ref-type="bibr">Doran, Cheng and AFP 2003</xref>). The reasons for these measures were that SARS was a new disease of unknown cause, origin, transmission, and treatment. As it turned out, simple and minor invasive strategies were found to be effective in stopping the spread of the virus; yet, what must be termed a panic spread faster than the disease itself (<xref rid="BIB6" ref-type="bibr">Lakshmanan 2003</xref>). Today, the World Health Organization recommends that SARS can be controlled by having departing tourists “answer two or three questions and [have] a temperature check” (<xref rid="BIB11" ref-type="bibr">WHO 2003b</xref>). Those with symptoms should be assessed by a health care worker, but others who have had no contact with probable cases require no special measures.</p><p>The experience highlights the need for stronger international collaboration and coordination among tourism departments to develop effective responses to cross-border crises. While most are limited in location, scale and duration, SARS was different in that it affected multiple countries and entire global regions simultaneously. The lack of central coordination among governments was highlighted by the sequential, country-by-country unveiling of reactive responses. It fueled fears that an out-of-control epidemic was spreading through Asia when, in fact, this was not the case. Indeed, SARS highlights the need to develop integrated national and international tourism crisis recovery strategies. The need for such strategies is urgent as even WHO did not appear to appreciate fully the consequences of issuing advisories on tourism. While it must be praised for its actions in controlling the spread of SARS, for a period of time it was instrumental in triggering the almost complete eradication of tourism in Asia. Its executive director was forced to go on public record in May to acknowledge that the perception of the threat posed by SARS and its consequences were based on an inaccurate interpretation of information that had been provided by WHO to governments and the public. He stated further that travel was not a contributor to the spread of SARS and that there was no reason why people should not travel (<xref rid="BIB7" ref-type="bibr">PATA 2003</xref>). Further, the actions taken by central governments not experiencing large-scale outbreaks also appear to have been taken without consideration of the impacts on tourism flows.</p><p>The scale of SARS and the level of community-wide panic it induced set it apart from other crises, but it is not a unique event. Asian tourism has faced a number of major urgencies in the past 10 years, such as the feared “Y2K” computer collapse at the end of 1999 and it will, no doubt, face many more in the years to come. The effects of SARS, however, highlight the need for research into the bases and motivations as well as the mechanics and preparation for optimal national recovery strategies and greater international cooperation. ■A</p></body><back><ref-list><title>References</title><ref id="BIB1"><mixed-citation publication-type="other">Benitez, M. 2003 Virus unchecked would have affected billions: professor. South China Morning Post (September 27):C3.</mixed-citation></ref><ref id="BIB2"><mixed-citation publication-type="other">CNN 2003 Deadly Virus Clues Emerge. CNN.com Mar 20, 2003. (March 20).</mixed-citation> </ref><ref id="BIB3"><mixed-citation publication-type="other">Doran, H., A. Cheng, and AFP 2003 World Closes the Door on China over Virus Fears. South China Morning Post (May 14):A3.</mixed-citation></ref><ref id="BIB4"><mixed-citation publication-type="other">Fox, M. 2003 Top Officials Homing in on Killer Pneumonia. Reuters (Mar 21).</mixed-citation> </ref><ref id="BIB5"><mixed-citation publication-type="other">Frith, M. 2003 Sars Warning over Lufthansa Flight. London Evening Standard (April 11).</mixed-citation> </ref><ref id="BIB6"><mixed-citation publication-type="other">Lakshmanan, I. 2003 Hong Kong’s Fear of SARS Spreading Faster than the Disease Itself: 80% Residents Wearing Surgical Masks. Hotel-Online .</mixed-citation> </ref><ref id="BIB7"><mixed-citation publication-type="other">PATA 2003 People Should be Travelling. World Health Organization. Pacific Asia Tourism Association Press Release (May 2).</mixed-citation> </ref><ref id="BIB8"><element-citation publication-type="journal"><person-group person-group-type="author"><name><surname>Rodriguez-Garcia</surname><given-names>R</given-names></name></person-group><article-title>The Health-Development Link: Travel as a Public Health Issue</article-title><source>Journal of Contemporary Health</source><volume>26</volume><issue>2</issue><year>2001</year><fpage>93</fpage><lpage>112</lpage></element-citation></ref><ref id="BIB9"><mixed-citation publication-type="other">Shamdasani, R. 2003 Three more Die as Countries around the World take Drastic Steps to Halt SARS. The South China Morning Post (April 3):A2.</mixed-citation></ref><ref id="BIB10"><mixed-citation publication-type="other">WHO 2003a Summary of Probable SARS Cases with Onset of Illness from 1 November 2002 to 31 July 2003 (updated 23 September 2003 ). World Health Organization </ref><ref id="BIB11"><mixed-citation publication-type="other">WHO 2003b Summary of WHO Measures Related to International Travel, 24 June 2003. World Health Organization</ref><ref id="BIB12"><mixed-citation publication-type="other">WTTC 2003 Special SARS Analysis: Impact of Travel and Tourism (Hong Kong, China, Singapore and Vietnam reports). London: World Travel and Tourism Council.</mixed-citation></ref></ref-list><bio><p><bold>Bob McKercher:</bold> School of Hotel and Tourism Management, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China. Email <<ext-link ext-link-type="uri" xlink:href="mailto:hmbob@polyu.edu.hk">hmbob@inet.polyu.edu.hk</ext-link>></p></bio></back></pmc></record>Pour manipuler ce document sous Unix (Dilib)
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