It is almost a year since Ms Joanna McCartney opened her bed-and-breakfast in Carlingford's main street. Next door her restaurant, The Terrace, was thriving, and her self-catering accommodation attracted a steady stream of visitors.
Buoyed by the Belfast Agreement, Ms McCartney, like many others in the Co Louth Border town, had reinvested in her business. Until recently that investment was paying off.
"We had established a good reputation and we were getting very heavy bookings," she said.
Local people first began to notice a reduction in the number of visitors in February, when foot-and-mouth was found at a farm across the Border in Meigh. And when it was thought things could not get much worse, at the end of March the first outbreak in the State was traced to a farm in Proleek, in north Louth.
"The lights went out on all these tourism businesses. You had instant calls of apprehension and concern, followed by cancellations on a large scale," said Ms McCartney. "We started to lose money, big time."
These days her newly decorated medieval-style bedrooms, themed on The Cattle Raid of Cooley, lie empty. She has had to lay off three employees.
"One of the hardest things has been telling 50 per cent of my staff that I can only offer them part-time work. These women are local. This is not a story of how big business is being affected, but the devastating impact on small-to-medium family businesses.
"The downturn in fortunes can be seen in the faces of everyone in the town."
Nearby, at McKevitt's Village Hotel, the lunchtime rush has become a thing of the past.
"Because there aren't the numbers making up casual trade, lunch and dining custom has been almost wiped out, and our party business is completely gone," said Mr Terry McKevitt. He estimates his business is losing between £5,000 and £7,000 a week as bedroom occupancy falls to an all-time low.
When the phone rings now, he does not expect bookings, only cancellations.
He believes the situation has its roots in a misguided public perception rather than precautionary restrictions introduced to prevent the spread of the disease.
"People are not travelling to certain areas almost out of a sense of national pride, but as long as they take the necessary precautions there is no reason why they can't come to Cooley.
"They can't go to farmland but they can still go out on the mountains, or walk along the pier. There are great watersports, fantastic outdoor pursuits, and we need to get that message across," he said.
The crisis is felt across Louth, with tourism-providers in Dundalk, which falls within the 10km surveillance zone set up after the case was found in Proleek, among those worst hit.
At Ballymascanlon Hotel and Golf Course the manager, Mr Chris Braiden, said that customers who had booked short breaks a year in advance were now cancelling.
"Our golf course is closed. We have lost a lot of weekend business . . . Looking ahead is a problem. We just have our fingers crossed that there will be no more cases and hope that we can recoup mid-season."
Local people have set up the Carlingford-Cooley Taskforce to tackle the problem. Last week the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, the Minister for Social, Family and Community Affairs, Mr Dermot Ahern, who owns a house in the area, and the Minister for Tourism, Dr McDaid, met local business people to discuss ways of preventing further losses.
Mr Norman Black, tourism officer with East Coast and Midlands Tourism, said the taskforce and all concerned groups were preparing a marketing plan to attract visitors back to the area. The Government has been discussing deferment of VAT and rates payments in places where tourism has been affected.
Meanwhile the people of Carlingford and Cooley are philosophical.
"It is a bit like having a natural disaster. We are all battening down the hatches and riding the storm. People are fairly resilient along the Border area. Over the years we have got used to having to cope with adverse situations," said Mr McKevitt.
"Nobody is going to lie down under this," said Ms McCartney. "We are going to work as hard as we can to turn the corner."