New Cases of COVID Reflected in Week-Over-Week Hotel Review Trend

In the previous weeks, our Travel Health Index reflected encouraging progress in different countries and regions from all over the world. In Asia, China and Taiwan showed significant increases in the number of guest reviews and in Europe, Germany and Switzerland were the first countries to get out of the Lockdown status. However, the latest data shows a week-over-week decline in the review volume, possibly as a result of the new wave of COVID cases.

One of the most interesting findings that resulted from the THI analysis of the week ending July 5th targets Taiwan, the first country to have made its way up to the Declined state (just one step away from Steady on the THI key). While the current THI score is still encouraging, situated at 71, Taiwan’s week-over-week score has drastically decreased by -28. This means that in the week ending on July 5th, the review volume registered in Taiwan was significantly lower than the previous week. 

At the moment, other countries with a declining week-over-week trend are not experiencing such drastic drops: New Zealand and Switzerland are situated at -7 and China at -6. What is interesting to note is that Latvia has recently become the very first country to reach the Steady state on the THI on a global level, based on the number of guest reviews. However, the country’s week-over-week trend is also showing a decrease of -5. It is highly possible that the new wave of COVID-19 cases is influencing the hotel occupancy and implicitly, the volume of guest reviews. Things are changing at a rapid pace and for now, there is no clear, consistent trajectory to follow with a sense of complete confidence. This is why it’s crucial to keep an eye on the week over week changes in order to determine the direction in which travel and hospitality are headed, based on guest reviews from the largest review database in the world. 

Make sure to check the Travel Health Index for ongoing, weekly updates that are calculated both on a global and a regional level. If you are looking for more information and insightful advice on how to push through the crisis and prepare for recovery, check out our COVID-19 resource library.