As the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus continues to worry cause concern amongst the general public, the casino industry has started to react in dramatic fashion. Casinos all around the world continue to deal with the crisis in their own way, and in the past couple of days, that has mostly meant closing their doors.
Las Vegas
MGM Resorts announced on Sunday that they would close the doors of all their Las Vegas area casinos on March 17, and refuse to take new reservations prior to May 1.
“It is now apparent that this is a public health crisis that requires major collective action if we are to slow its progression,” said CEO Jim Murren. “We will plan to reopen our resorts as soon as it (is) safe to do so and we will continue to support our employees, guests, and communities in every way that we can during this period of closure.”
Wynn also announced they would be closing their two resorts for at least a period of two weeks.
In order to keep our employees and guests safe, we have decided to close Wynn Las Vegas and Encore on Tuesday, March 17, at 6 pm. We anticipate that we will be closed for two weeks, after which we will evaluate the situation. Visit https://t.co/ZVdFo0wUMc for regular updates.
— Wynn Las Vegas (@WynnLasVegas) March 16, 2020
In following tweets, Wynn noted that guests with reservations beyond March 17 could receive full refunds, if booked with Wynn directly, and guests currently staying at either of their resorts should make arrangements to leave before that date.
Macau
With its 15 day shutdown will in the past, Macau is proving healthy enough that China may decide to allow travel there once again. Nomurra hypothesized that the region around Macau might see its travel restrictions relaxed as early as May, bringing back tourists desperately needed by casino resorts.
That was before Macau recorded its 11th case of COVID-19, a South Korean non-resident worker who had recently travelled to Portugal. She’s the first new case found in the territory since before their casino shutdown.
Manila
Although casinos initially looked like they may remain open after a community quarantine was declared, their regulator, the Philippine Amusement and Gaming Corporation (PAGCOR) have announced all gaming operations would be suspended immediately, effective March 15.
At the time of the announcement, the suspension applied to land-based casinos, eGames, bingo (traditional and electronic), sports betting, poker and slot machine clubs. While resorts would be allowed to continue operating their restaurants, an escalation of the quarantine on Monday, which states all establishments should be closed, may prevent customers not staying at the hotel from visiting them.
Those are some of the major hotspots affected by casino shutdowns, but of course there are many more. At this point, if you live near a casino and aren’t sure if it’s still open, it would probably be wiser and faster to just sign up with an online operation and have some fun that way.
