A Saudi official said Tuesday that the hajj pilgrimage, which usually draws up to 2.5 million Muslims from all over the world, will only see at the most a few thousand pilgrims next month due to concerns over the spread of the coronavirus.
The kingdom's Hajj Minister Muhammad Benten said a "small and very limited" number of people - even as low as just 1,000 from inside the kingdom - will be allowed to perform the pilgrimage to ensure social distancing and crowd control amid the global virus outbreak.
"The number, God willing, may be in the thousands. We are in the process of reviewing so it could be 1,000 or less, or a little more," Benten said in a virtual press conference.