Greek island hit by migrant crisis, says hotel search site
Interest in holidays to the Greek island of Kos has plummeted since media reports of migrants from Africa flooding its resorts, according to new data from hotel search website trivago.co.uk.
It claimed that accommodation searches made by UK users from May 26 to 31 compared to searches made during the previous week for any future travel date were down by 52%.
A news report claiming British holidaymakers were offended by migrants on the island appeared in the Daily Mail last Tuesday.
While travel interest to Kos dropped, searches to the other Greek islands increased by up to 66%, with the exception of Corfu, which dropped 5%, said Trivago.
As a result, Kos dropped in popularity from the seventh to the eight most popular Greek island.
Company spokeswoman Denise Bartlett said: "Of course we cannot speculate what caused British holidaymakers to change their search queries over this time period, but it would appear the news of migrants on Kos caused not only a drop in travel interest to this island, but a corresponding increase in hotel searches to other Greek islands – which are so far unaffected by the migrant situation."
Linsey McNeill
Editor Linsey McNeill has been writing about travel for more than three decades. Bylines include The Times, Telegraph, Observer, Guardian and Which? plus the South China Morning Post. She also shares insider tips on thetraveljournalist.co.uk
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