SHANGHAI — It would have been one of the biggest tour-group catches of the year for California: Some 500 employees of a Beijing outsourcing company going on an 11-day excursion to Los Angeles and San Francisco, with a side trip to the Mexican coastal town of Ensenada.
But the outbreak of swine flu quickly put an end to those summer plans. Workers at China International Intellectech Corp. are now looking at Europe, said Yu Hui, a manager at Beijing U-Tour International Travel Service, which had prepared the so-called incentive trip for the company.
"I'm very worried right now," Yu said, noting that four other groups destined for California and other parts of the U.S. had canceled because of swine flu. Even Chinese headed for remote Alaska are putting their plans on ice, she said.
Cancellations and postponements from travelers bound for Mexico, the epicenter of the virus outbreak, have been coming from all over the world in the last week. Now the disease is starting to hurt tourism in the U.S. And with the first confirmed death from swine flu in the U.S. -- a 22-month-old Mexican infant in Texas -- the economic toll is likely to get worse.
The specter of losing more Chinese tourists is particularly worrisome for California. Visitors from China account for the fastest-growing segment of the state's multibillion-dollar tourism industry. It had been one of the bright spots in an otherwise gloomy economy, and state officials were hoping that tourism could drive a recovery.
Early last month, California officials were in China for the formal opening of three tourism offices, part of a big push to tap Chinese consumers' growing wealth and penchant for seeing the world.
But to many Chinese, the photos and video footage of Americans wearing masks have conjured images of the 2003 epidemic of severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, giving even those with wanderlust a case of cold feet.
Jamie Lee of the Los Angeles Convention and Visitors Bureau in China said several dozen Chinese who had made plans to attend the Los Angeles Film Festival in June had backed out. If swine flu cases keep piling up -- more than 160 have been confirmed in the United States -- Lee fears the Chinese government will issue a travel warning for the U.S., as it already has for Mexico. That could prove devastating, she said.
