Princess Cruises has canceled five upcoming cruise ship arrivals to Cozumel, Quintana Roo, after it announced that it will voluntarily and temporarily suspend its global operations for the next 60 days.
The Regal Princess, set to dock on March 13 and 27, the Sky Princess, set to arrive on March 19 and April 10, and the Caribbean Princess, set to arrive on April 30, would have brought 21,546 passengers to Cozumel in the next couple of months.
The director general of the Integral Port Administration of Quintana Roo, Alicia Ricalde Magaña, said that the region will lose an estimated $1.76 million in tourism revenue from the one company’s customers alone, basing its estimate on the fact that the average cruise ship passenger spends around US $82 upon disembarking.
The economic impact of cruise ship passengers in Quintana Roo is seen in services such as tours, food and drinks in bars and restaurants, folk art and souvenir sales and transportation to other popular destinations on the Caribbean coast, such as Playa del Carmen and Tulum.
The port authority said that it will make all of its facilities available to Princess Cruises once the coronavirus scare has subsided. It also said that it has worked to maintain sanitary conditions throughout the crisis.
“Since the arrival of the first suspicious case aboard a cruise ship, we have implemented preventative hygienic measures, such as putting in handwashing sinks in every terminal we administer, as well as antibacterial gel,” said Ricalde.
She also urged the public to get information via official channels and avoid being misinformed by false news reports.
There are currently 15 confirmed cases of the coronavirus known as Covid-19 in Mexico, but health officials say that a widespread outbreak in the coming weeks is inevitable.
Sources: Milenio (sp), El Economista (sp)
