Singapore tourism bounces back

Singapore tourism bounces back

SINGAPORE: Singapore's tourism industry bounced back strongly in April from the same month last year when the city-state was hammered by an outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome, the government said on Monday.

The wealthy Southeast Asian nation saw 651,860 arrivals in April, more than double the figure for the previous year, when the SARS scare was at its height, the Singapore Tourist Board said.

April's arrivals were also 5 percent higher than the same month in 2002, a year that was unscathed by SARS and thus provided a better comparison, it said. -- AFP