COVID-19 and the invisible war: Is it the end of hospitality?

Abstract

The outbreak of the virus known as Sars-Cov2 [or coronavirus] has been significant blow that confirms a trend initiated after 2001 to the self-cannibalization or finishing of Western hospitality, but rather transforms the body itself and disposes it as a weapon to attack the other. As already mentioned, the old dichotomy between the tourist desired as an agent of economic growth and the immigrant feared as an unwanted guest gives way to a new landscape, where the tourist is seen—with some suspicion—as a potential enemy. Like the war against cancer in 1970, the war against local crime in the 1990s, and the war against terror in 2001, the world is now living a war against a virus. In this new world, classical hospitality gives way to an absolute hospitality where the hotel is recycled as a hospital.