ABSTRACT
This chapter examines issues related to the constraining factors of tourism business during the COVID-19 pandemic. The focus is on young tourists' perceptions of potential travel risks measured by the following indicators: health risks, non-health risks, denying the severity of risks and expected benefits from the crisis. Data were gathered between June-October 2020 from 206 Tourism and Hospitality students at the University of Novi Sad (Serbia) by applying the questionnaire created for the specific purpose of this research. The findings indicate the impact of the outbreak on young tourists' travel plans. Results showed that youth travelers could be the carriers of reviving the international tourism, considering the fact that almost every third respondent is ready to travel even in the COVID-19 crisis circumstances. Concretely, due to the COVID-19 virus pandemic, 69% of young tourists changed their choice of destination, but they did not change the accommodation type, their travel companion, nor the length of their visit. The results also indicated that young generations of tourists are more concerned about the quality of vacation, including health and non-health risks. To some extent, young tourists deny risks of getting disease and they expect to accumulate some savings while travelling during the COVID-19 pandemic. Finally, based on our measures of travel risks perception, we defined several clusters of young tourists identified as cautious optimists, opportunistic, utilitarian, and lethargic young tourists. For example, the opportunistic young tourists are most willing to travel, regardless of the health risks. Furthermore, utilitarian young tourists are those who expect concrete financial benefits from travelling during the pandemics. Lethargic young tourists do not demonstrate an awareness of risks nor they can estimate if the COVID-19 outbreak will affect their travel plans. We believe that this initial classification of young tourists might direct tourism and hospitality-based managers or policy-makers on how to create vacation packages for these consumers as well as to assist stakeholders involved in providing services to the young tourists during the outbreak times. It is important to note that participants in this research are future tourism managers and, therefore, their perception of travel risks during pandemics might be of particular significance. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022.
ABSTRACT
Athletes' lifestyles have been dramatically affected by the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Since COVID-19 primarily affects the respiratory system and to a lesser degree the cardiovascular system, the goal of this study was to examine the effects of COVID-19-caused detraining on cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF) of recently recovered volleyball athletes. Sixteen experienced volleyball athletes (age 24 +/- 4.5 years) who were recently diagnosed and recovered from a COVID-19 infection volunteered to participate in this study and were tested for CRF and spirometry. Given that participants had only mild symptoms of infection, the primary focus of this study was on the effects of detraining on CRF. On average, the time to exhaustion was 9.4 +/- 1.4 min. VE, VCO<sub>2</sub>, RER and oxygen pulse increased, heart rate exceeded 90% of predicted values, and peak VO<sub>2</sub> values were typical for this level of athlete (44.1 +/- 3.4 mL/kg). Pulmonary function reflected in FVC, FEV1/FVC and MVV values were well above 80% of predicted values for each of the participants while electrocardiography revealed no ischemia, arrythmias or conduction and repolarization abnormalities were found in the tested subjects. Therefore, it can be concluded that participants experienced typical consequences of detraining. Due to a lack of CRF data prior to COVID-19 infection, we were unable to estimate the magnitude detraining had on CRF. Complete CRF assessment after COVID-19 infection in athletes can be useful for screening of residual myocardial and/or respiratory system damage for safe return-to-play decisions.