The blind founder of tour operator Traveleyes has urged the industry to pull together, reduce costs and be ready for the bookings bounce-back after fearing he might die of coronavirus.
Amar Latif, who spent a week in Leeds Infirmary suffering from coronavirus, has temporarily closed his firm, cancelled trips until the end of May and furloughed six of his seven staff. Traveleyes takes groups, half of which are blind and half fully sighted, on adventure holidays.
He said: “I am just so grateful to be alive and able to breathe. I didn’t think I was going to come out of hospital alive.
“There is nothing more important than your health so everyone needs to follow the guidelines, even if they are bored at home. People are fighting for breath in hospital.
“We are all in this together. Yes, it is tough, but I do think that as soon as this is over people will want to travel and see the world and things will pick up. We have given credits as vouchers to customers but I don’t think the government has ‘got it’ yet: if we gave refunds to everybody we would go bankrupt.
“It’s best to minimise your costs but communicate well with customers, and be ready for the bounce back.”
Latif said he felt conflicting emotions during his stint in hospital after being admitted with a temperature of 40 degrees and struggling to breathe.
He recalled: “I was blind and I was confused and not all the nurses realised at first that I couldn’t see.
“I didn’t think I was going to come out of hospital alive. I was thinking I had worked so hard and I should have enjoyed life a bit more. I was worried I hadn’t written a will but I didn’t have the energy to anything or to call anyone.
“I was really inspired by the nurses. They were such angels. One minute I was thinking I am not going to come out of hospital alive and the next minute I was thinking how inspired I was by these selfless people [nurses].”
Latif said the experience of the last few weeks would “push him to the next level” of his career. In the last two years he has taken a step back from the day to day running of the business to do more TV work and change perceptions about blindness as a disability.
“I am going to push myself to places I didn’t possible,” he added.