Coronavirus has the world in its grip for now, leading to lockdowns across cities and countries, including India that is under a complete lockdown for 21 days. A fast-spreading viral infection, COVID-19 has now led to a shutdown of three of the busiest national parks in the US—the Yellowstone, Grand Teton and the Great Smoky Mountains.
Even as Americans were ordered to stay at home and practice social distancing to stall spread of Coronavirus, the three national parks started seeing visitors. Reportedly, the three national parks saw a number of people converging there over the week. It led to orders of immediate closure of the three national parks by the National Park Service. The step has been taken to curtail any further spread of the virus and bar people from getting close to each other.
Officials reported that the number of visitors to the park surged over the past week, with the Great Smoky Mountains National Park seeing close to 35000 people a day, 5000 more than last March. All the national parks also saw an increase owing to warmer weather, and sprouting of wildflowers all over. Reportedly, Yellowstone and Grand Teton are the sixth and eighth most visited national parks last year.
The national parks are expected to stay shut for a while now, until further notice.
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