South Africans await conclusions on Ômicron to resume tourism

The population of South Africa received with “frustration” the information that there would be new restrictions on international flights to the country to contain the spread of the Ômicron variant. People who work in tourism and were ready to resume activities were the most affected by the announcements, said Fernanda Curti, a Brazilian data scientist who lives in South Africa.”

“People are hopeful that information will be released that the variant is not so dangerous and that everything will return to normal, and tourism will resume,” Fernanda told CNN this Tuesday (30).

She says that, with the arrival of the vaccine and the control of the pandemic, the perspective was for a reopening to tourism, one of the most important sectors of the South African economy. “We were hopeful, carrying out works and preparing for the tourists who would arrive during the summer,” he said.

She says that, since the announcement of the closing of the air borders, local tourism and the South African population have already felt a new blow. “With the dissemination of the new variant and with the blockades, the population was frustrated”.

Sense of Penalty

The data scientist said that the people of South Africa believe they are helping the world prepare for a possible new danger and that the flight restriction measures ended up penalizing the South Africans.

She says that the fact that the researchers pointed out that the variant had not emerged in the country, and that South African scientists were helping to map the new variant, was not received by other nations as the South Africans had hoped.

“When there was the disclosure of this new sequencing, the population was seeing it as positive. ‘We did the world a favor so that they prepare themselves and South Africa is being penalized’”, said Fernanda about the feeling she perceived in the population.

“After that, South Africans came to see border blocking.”