The industry suffered a further blow when Russia announced a halt to tourist flights until June 1, something the Turkish government said would mean 500,000 fewer travellers. Moscow says the ban could be extended.

In an attempt to attract tourists, Ankara announced that visitors from 15 countries, including the UK, China and Ukraine, would not require a negative test result to enter Turkey.

Taylan Buyuksahin, economics editor at the SÖZCÜ newspaper, said Turkey was dependent on foreign income from exports and tourism.

“For Turkey, tourism is a factory without chimneys,” he said. “They can’t close it down. To convince and send a message to countries where many tourists come from, such as the UK and Russia, they announced this lockdown.”

Turkey’s 17-day lockdown closed most shops, barring food outlets and pharmacies, while people were ordered to stay at home apart from those in exempted industries.

This sparked what the Istanbul Medical Chamber called a “mass migration” of city residents to coastal regions as hundreds of thousands headed to the Aegean and Mediterranean – the exact locations where Turkey hopes swarms of foreign tourists will arrive after the curfew ends.

“They carried the mutant-variant viruses to those areas,” Prof Saltik said. “We will see the terrible results of this Covid migration after two weeks.

“Moreover, they will return to their cities following the Turkish-type, short synthetic lockdown. They not only carried the mutant virus types to tourism areas but they will also bring them back to the cities.”

This pattern could be repeated on an international scale with the arrival of foreigners, Prof Bulut said, increasing the strain on local health facilities.

The majority of those who flocked to the coast were wealthier, office-based staff. Many blue-collar workers, meanwhile, simply carried on.

“The lack of any social funding during the lockdown means that about 22 million people are at work now,” Prof Bulut said.

“People in factories and construction are still working. These workers, if they develop Covid-19 symptoms, often don’t report it because they need to stay at work to have any income.”

Turkey’s vaccination programme appears to be lagging. After a promising start in January, fewer than 14 million have received their first dose in a country of nearly 84 million. About 8.5 million are fully vaccinated.

“After the lockdown there will be a fifth peak because there’s not sufficient vaccination and a lack of contact tracing,” Prof Bulut said.

“Maybe they imagine they might cheat the world but, no, they can’t.”