“We have to be careful what kind of tourism we ask for,” head of the Tulum Hotel Association David Ortiz Mena said, according to the WSJ. “The kind of tourism we fostered creates drug demand, and where there is demand there will be supply. But the drug dealers don’t leave when the party’s over and the tourists go home.”
Tourists staying at luxury hotels in Cancun and Tulum are noticing a massive uptick in cartel violence as the vacation hotspots have quickly become a key revenue source for drug sales, The Wall Street Journal reported Sunday.
Cartels see the area of Quintana Roo, where the two resort towns are located, as a cash cow for drug sales, where their customers are easily accessible, making it easier and cheaper to traffic drugs, the WSJ reported. The homicide rate in the state has almost quadrupled since 2016 in an increase that is attributed to drugs.
“Our basic problem is drug demand by tourists,” Quintana Roo Attorney General Oscar Montes de Oca said, according to the WSJ.
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