In Miami and around Florida last week, tourism officials
called on visitors to take precautions, but also to keep their perspective in
the wake of the first confirmed, locally acquired Zika cases in the U.S.
Yet, one expert said the news out of the Miami
neighborhood of Wynwood could prove to be more than just a blip on the radar.
“I can’t tell you right now whether this is truly a small,
isolated outbreak or whether it is the first indication of a much wider
problem,” said Jonathan Day, a University of Florida medical entomologist. “My
feeling is that this small, local outbreak just north of Miami is probably just
a first indication of something larger.”
As of last Friday, officials had confirmed that 16 people
had acquired Zika within a square-mile portion of Wynwood, a neighborhood
just north of downtown Miami famous for its street art and popular for its
outdoor cafes.
The outbreak caused the Centers for Disease Control and
Protection to issue an unprecedented domestic travel advisory. Pregnant women,
the agency warned, should stay out of the Zika zone, and men and women who
visit there should wait eight weeks before trying to get pregnant.
Public Health England has issued a similar advisory about
travel to Wynwood.
Tourism industry representatives last week acknowledged the
health concerns but also stressed that virtually all of Florida, and indeed
almost all of the Miami area, is free of locally acquired Zika.
In a prepared statement, Visit Florida CEO Will
Seccombe said that the health and safety of visitors was the organization’s
highest priority and noted that it has “complete confidence” in the Zika
response efforts of state and local authorities.
“The Florida Department of Health reports that the only
locally transmitted cases to date are confined to a neighborhood in Miami. For
perspective, that’s a one-square-mile area in a state that covers more than
65,000 square miles,” Seccombe said.
Rolando Aedo, chief marketing officer for the Greater Miami
Convention & Visitors Bureau, took a similar approach, suggesting that
pregnant women stay out of the advisory zone and that visitors wear mosquito
repellent. But he otherwise noted that Miami, and Wynwood itself, are open for
business.
Aedo expressed confidence that the Zika outbreak won’t have
a long-term impact on tourism in the Magic City, noting the power of Miami’s
global brand as well as what he called the sophistication of the modern traveler.
“The life cycle of this and the stigma of this will be very,
very short-lived,” he predicted.
But Florida tourism expert Lori Pennington-Gray was not so
sure. She said that the Zika outbreak, falling on the heels of other recent
Florida events that have attracted national and international attention, could
lead to a dip in visitation to the Sunshine State.
“The life cycle of this and the stigma of this will be very, very short-lived.” — Rolando Aedo, Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau
“I think Florida now will to have to be a lot more cautious
and be prepared that people may choose not to come here,” said Pennington-Gray,
who conducts studies on the behavioral patterns of tourists as part of her job
as the director of the Tourism Crisis Management Institute at the University of
Florida.
She cited a buildup of bad news that began with the Pulse
nightclub shooting in Orlando on June 12. Two days later, a 2-year-old boy was
attacked and killed by an alligator at a Disney World resort. Then came a
highly publicized algae bloom in the waters along Florida’s central east coast
before last week’s confirmation of the first locally acquired Zika cases in the
U.S.
A June study conducted by the Tourism Crisis Management
Institute found that only 5% of those who were considering a trip to Florida in
the coming six months had changed their plans due to Zika, though more than 50%
said they would take extra precautions. But that was when the only people in
Florida infected by Zika had become infected while traveling. Pennington-Grey
said the institute was now considering a follow-up study.
“The very nature of the destination itself is inherently linked
to outdoor activities,” she said. “So I think people may choose to go other
places because they are going to have to consider protecting themselves.”
Of course, how potential Florida visitors respond to the
Miami Zika cases will in large part be determined by whether it remains an
isolated occurrence.
Day, the entomologist, said that health officials should
know that answer in the next two weeks. But he said his hunch is that the
outbreak will extend beyond Miami’s Wynwood neighborhood.
The reason, he said, is that people who are infected with
Zika carry high counts of the virus in their blood. In fact, he said, they
carry higher blood-virus counts than people infected by dengue fever or
chikungunya, both of which, like Zika, are spread by the Aedes aegypti species
of mosquito.
The density of the virus’ presence in the blood makes it
easier for a mosquito that bites an infected person to pass it on to the next
person it bites.
Meanwhile, as of last week, there had been 157 confirmed
cases of travel-related Zika in the Miami and Fort Lauderdale areas.
Day added that even in a small area like Wynwood, the Aedes
aegypti will be hard to eradicate as the mosquito often hides in vegetation,
trash or other nooks and crannies where the insecticide doesn’t reach them.
“I have a hard time believing that it is going
to be focused in one square mile north of Miami,” he said.