May 20, when the first MERS related case was reported, its outbreak scares away tourists and domestic consumers enough to have the government to worry about its effect on their economy.

According to the Culture, Sports and Tourism Ministry, from June 1, foreign travellers and tourists overseas have cancelled their trips to South Korea because of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome outbreak. More than 120,000 trips have been cancelled already, according to Reuters.

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In Asia, after spreading from the Middle East the disease, which was first reported in South Korea in May sickened 172 people and killed 27 people as of June 22.

MERS, just like the Sewol tragedy which was happened last year is hitting the economy at a time when it had been showing signs of recovery in sentiment.

After the shocking Sewol tragedy which 300 people have died, mostly school children, the nation plunged into mourning and consumer spending slumped, according to New York Times.

On June 11, Governor Lee Ju Yeol warned that the said disease poses an "imminent risk" to consumption and production. The Government already spends allocation for the tests that could make antidotes to slow down the outbreak or can cure the said plague.

As Choi Kyung-hwan, the minister of strategy and finance, told Parliament on Monday that adding the government was considering a supplementary budget to help stimulate the domestic demand dampened by the MERS scare the outbreak, "has already had a significant impact on the economy", he says.

Report says that there already decline of 202 people from the previous day and degrade from a peak of more than 6,700 people last week, the number of people who were in quarantine was also down to 3,833 as of Monday.

Korea's central Bank, which earlier had cut its benchmark interest rate to a historic low, said last week that it would provide 650 billion won, or $590 million in funding to small and midsize enterprises affected by the outbreak, according to Bloomberg.

As Park Yong-maan, the chairman of the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry speaks, "It's fortunate that MERS is slowly subsiding, but the economic sentiment remains constricted", he says.

TagsMERS, mers covs, MERS corona virus, mers cov south korea, mers cov korea