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Local and federal authorities could have contained the spread of a coronavirus outbreak that infected thousands of tourists at two Austrian ski resorts, according to a new report.
“As of March 8, a correct assessment should have led to the closure of bars, the stopping of the ski lifts and the orderly management of departures,” of tourists from Ischgl, a village in the western state of Tyrol, found the experts in a report seen by AFP.
Instead, after a bartender in Ischgl tested positive for Covid-19 on March 7, tourists were not informed.
The skiing and partying continued for several days until March 13 when the immediate and complete closure of Ischgl and Saint Anton, a nearby ski resort, was announced.
Tourists were forced to evacuate in a matter of hours, and in the end, more than 6,000 people from 45 countries, including Britain, the United States and Germany, said they had contracted Covid-19 on vacation.
“There were errors in judgment that had consequences,” Ronald Rohrer, head of the commission and former vice president of the Austrian Supreme Court, told a press conference in Innsbruck, the capital of the state of Tyrol, on Monday.
Mismanagement has been blamed for allowing sick tourists to carry the virus to their respective countries of origin at a time when much of Europe had yet to see cases, and before the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus as a pandemic.
The report, based on an investigation by a commission of experts created by the state government, also found serious errors in the way that Chancellor Sebastian Kurz announced the quarantine, calling it “improvised and without considering the necessary preparations.”
“It provoked a panic reaction among tourists and there was a traffic chaos,” the report said.
Two press releases, one of which called the risk of infection “quite unlikely” despite the fact that the bartender worked in a crowded apres-ski bar frequented by more than 200 tourists, were “false” and “bad”.
Communications between state and regional officials seen by AFP also show that authorities misled the public into “pulling Ischgl out of the line of fire,” according to an email sent by Landeck district chief Markus Maass, who runs Ischgl.
The documents seen by AFP include official letters in which the Tyrol prosecutor informs four people, Maass, the mayor of Ischgl, Werner Kurz and two other officials, that they are being investigated for intentionally or negligently endangering people to through a contagious disease.
Three German survivors and the family of an Austrian who died of the coronavirus after spending his holidays in Ischgl are claiming compensation of between 12,000 and 100,000 euros from the Austrian authorities.
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