The spread of the Zika virus across Miami last summer severely infected earnings at Wynwood businesses, some of which saw revenue and profit dip by as much as 40 percent, according to a new study by Florida International University’s Robert Stempel College of Public Health & Social Work.
Conducted from Aug. 15 to Oct. 19 last year, the study surveyed 44 business, including restaurants, bars, retail stores, art galleries and others, during the height of the Zika scare. A one-square-mile area of Wynwood was designated a Zika zone in August by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The advisory was lifted Sept. 19.
Despite promotional visits by Miami Mayor Tomás Regalado and Gov. Rick Scott and giveaways like free parking, business plummeted. Some outdoor businesses closed completely, both out of fear that their customers and employees would contract the mosquito-borne illness that causes birth defects.
Read more from our news partners at the Miami Herald.
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