COVID-19: bracing for the worst

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC - In Brief 12 Mar 2020 by Pavel Isa

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Although only six cases of people infected with COVID-19 have been detected in the country, all imported (tourists or residents who were recently in Europe), and no case of domestic transmission has been recorded, our sources indicate that the authorities are preparing for the worst. Following the example of El Salvador and the United States, the authorities are likely to decide soon to restrict international passenger arrivals. Perhaps it begins with mandatory quarantine for passengers arriving from high-risk countries or prohibiting arrivals from Europe. Two weeks ago, arrivals from Italy were banned. What we expect is that, both due to a reduction in demand and the travel restrictions that the government ends up imposing, the impact on tourism will be very severe. Until the beginning of this week, our sources in the sector informed us that no significant cancellations of reservations had been reported, except for business tourism in Santo Domingo, but it is a matter of time for it to start happening. “Hotels, bars and restaurants”, in which tourism has a very high weight, explains between 7% and 8% of GDP. After exports of goods (about USD 11 bn), tourism is the main source of foreign exchange (about USD 8 bn) and has important linkages with the rest of economy. Despite that, at this point, the government's priority is surely to prevent COVID-19 from spreading because national capacities to deal with the epidemic are very limited. The public health network has less than 8,500 beds, of which 7% (less than 600) correspond to Intensive Care Units (ICU), and the available idle capacity is very low. Furthermore, the state's ability to restrict population movement, one of...