COVID leaves a cloud hanging over the tropics

Harry Sou had devoted two decades to building a Chinese restaurant empire in far north Queensland, serving up to 1000 hungry international tourists a time from its base at the Cairns casino.

Now he has retreated from five restaurants to a 50-seat venue off a service station car park that caters for locals and the occasional road-tripper.

“I’d like to think this pandemic is only once in 100 years,” Sou quips. “I don’t think bad luck will come so regularly … nothing like this scale.”

Empty shops with “For Lease” signs and shuttered hotels highlight the economic pain the pandemic caused the tropical far north…