A statue to tempt tourists into the eye of influenza storm?
This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.
You may remember Édgar Hernández from the end of last month. The 5-year-old, who lives with his mother and 3-year-old brother in the southeastern Mexican state of Veracruz, was the first person from his country known to have been infected with the H1N1 virus here.
Now a local governor wants to erect a statue of young Hernandez in the pueblo where he lives, La Gloria, in an effort to attract tourists.
The New York Times reports that Gov. Fidel Herrera ...
‘considers Édgar to be not “Patient Zero,” the source of a global outbreak, but rather the first person in the world known to have survived the virus. In an interview with local reporters on Sunday, the governor likened the statue, which might be made of concrete or bronze, to the Manneken Pis in Brussels, the sculpture of a little boy peeing in a fountain.’
Mexico’s tourist industry has taken a severe hit since the outbreak of the H1N1 strain of influenza in late April. As Joy Hepp, a writer for Frommers, reported on her blog Chilangabacha from Cancun and its environs:
‘While I was enjoying a $30-a-week (plus tax and insurance) rental car, crowd-free beaches and 50% off just about everything, hoteliers were shutting down their properties indefinitely, taxi drivers waited at the airport for passengers who would never arrive and celebrity chefs at the fancy resorts in Cancún’s Zona Hotelera got unexpected vacations.’
On Monday, Mexico President Felipe Calderon launched an advertising campaign called ‘Mexico Vive’ (Mexico Lives) in an attempt to resuscitate the country’s tourism industry.
But it’s hard to see how tourists are going to be persuaded to visit the eye of the storm - La Gloria - when it’s proving difficult to tempt them back to the country’s paradise-like beaches.
-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City
*This post was edited at 5:20pm Mexico City time on May 26th. The Government’s campaign is called ‘Vive’, not ‘Viva’, Mexico.