Travel agents say no immediate impacts from pandemic

      Three days after the World Health Organization announced the global influenza H1N1 pandemic, local travel agents still do not see immediate impacts but say that the bad news is prompting more difficulties for the tourism sector.
Most tour operators said they did not see massive canceling of inbound tours, but were afraid that arrivals in the year-end high season would be affected.
Vo Anh Tai, director of Saigontourist Travel Service Company, told the Daily on Sunday that his company’s foreign partners had not announced any tour cancellations due to the WHO pandemic announcement.
“Tourist arrivals to the country have been falling due to the global economic crisis and the low season of the inbound sector,” he said.
Tao Van Nghe, general director of the five-star Majestic hotel, shared the viewpoint, but estimated that the number of visitors would fall strongly in the coming time.
“Our occupancy is very low. We had suffered cancellations before WHO made the announcement. This is however a bad signal for the coming time,” he said.
Nghe, who is also chairman of the HCMC Hotel Society, said that many hotels in the city were in the same situation.
Director of Asian Trails Co. Bui Viet Thuy Tien did not see any tour cancellations at her company either.
“Our business is as usual. I think that the impact if any will emerge after one week or in the next high season,” she said.
Nguyen The Khai, director of Perfect Tour Travel Co. Ltd, which specializes in arranging outbound tours to the U.S., confirmed that there was no immediate decline in the number of visitors since last Thursday although the company is already facing bad impacts from the outbreak.
“Our guests are still departing to the U.S. every week but the total number of visitors is lower than in previous times, down by around 30-40%,” he said.
Some tour operators in HCMC have taken measures to calm tourists and protect them.
Saigontourist has started giving health masks to all outbound tourists, while all tour guides have been trained about the flu to protect tourists.
Vietravel in a press release last Friday said that the company has inked a special deal with Bao Minh Insurance Corporation to insure Vietravel’s tourists against risks of H1N1.
However, HCMC’s tourism entrepreneurs hope that the impact of H1N1 on the tourism industry should be slight because WHO has made positive comments about the pandemic.
“WHO continues to recommend no restrictions on travel and no border closures,” WHO’s Director General Dr Margaret Chan said in her statement to the press last Thursday.
Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung in a meeting with the health sector last Friday also confirmed no border closures in Vietnam. The Prime minister believes that the country will be able to control the disease.
So far, the national tourism authority has issued warnings local tour operators to limit or temporarily stop sending local tourist to flu-hit countries.