The novel coronavirus pandemic has caused a combined 8.82 trillion won ($7.4 billion) worth of damage to South Korea's culture, sports and tourism sectors since it broke out early last year, a government report showed Friday.

The amount of consumer spending in the tourism and leisure sector decreased by an estimated 39.3 trillion won from January 2020-June 2021 when Korea's first COVID-19 case was reported, according to the report by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism submitted to parliament.

The damage was valued at 26.9 trillion won in 2020 and 12.4 trillion won during the first half of 2021.

The content creation industry saw consumer spending fall by 2.9 trillion over the 18-month period, including 2.4 trillion won in damage from the filmmaking field.

In the culture and arts sector, the pandemic-caused loss was estimated at 1.2 trillion won over the cited period, while the sporting business posted a 44.8 trillion-won drop in consumer spending due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The culture ministry said it is mapping out rescue plans totaling 2.6 trillion won to help the damaged sectors stay afloat. (Yonhap)