HEALTH PROTOCOLS – AN INSTRUMENT TO IMPROVE HOTELS' SUSTAINABLE PRODUCTS

Abstract

Tourism products have sustainable characteristics as far as they target both ecological and social aspects. The recent COVID-19 virus has generated major changes in economic activities and in our daily life. Tourism is among the most affected economic sectors, the tourism activities registering a worrying decline. The World Health Organization and other official organisations have introduced specific prevention and control measures to be applied by the accommodation units. The article analyzes the main sanitary measures imposed by the official authorities, both national and international. At the same time, another objective of the article is the analysis of the plans in action introduced by the best-known hotel brands in their attempt to limit the effects produced by the virus and the resumption of the hotel activities. Also, the article presents the results of an analysis among the Romanian 5-star hotels from the most visited tourism destinations, respectively mountain and seaside destinations. The topic of the research aims the assessment of the information provided to their guests on the sanitary measures undertaken by the hotels management teams. The results obtained highlight an unexpected and also sad situation, as most of the analyzed Romanian hotels do not provide any information on this topic.

Keywords

• health protocols
• hotels
• covid-19 pandemic