S.Korea's travel account posts largest deficit in 7 years on MERS aftermath

South Korea's travel account deficit posted the largest in about seven years due to the effect from the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) outbreak, central bank data showed Wednesday.

The travel account balanced logged a deficit of 1.45 billion U. S. dollars in July, the largest since July 2008 when it registered a 1.65 billion-dollar deficit, according to the Bank of Korea (BOK) .

The travel account deficit continued to increase from 0.41 billion dollars in May to 1.04 billion dollars in June as the deadly viral disease discouraged foreign tourists from visiting the country.

The MERS corona virus infected 186 people, among whom 36 passed away. South Korea became the most MERS-contagious country in the world except for Saudi Arabia, where the disease first emerged in 2012 and more than 1,000 cases have since been reported.

According to the government data, more than 130,000 foreign tourists canceled their travel plan to Seoul in June alone when the viral disease peaked. The government declared the de-facto end of MERS spread in late July amid no report of new infection case for more than three weeks.

The number of foreigners visiting South Korea almost halved in July compared with the same month of last year, contributing to the rise in travel account deficit, the central bank said. Endi