File photo: A jet plane of Atlanta-based Delta Air Lines is parked at the Shanghai Pudong International Airport in Shanghai, China.

US airlines scrambling to halt flights to China over the novel coronavirus outbreak will cause sizable economic losses for the US air carriers, in addition to making difficulty for personnel exchange of both countries, industry analysts said.

Delta Air Lines, American Airlines and United Airlines said on Friday morning (US time) that they would halt services between the Chinese mainland and the US, hours before the Trump administration said it would bar entry to all foreign visitors who had recently been there.

American Airlines said it would suspend all flights to and from the mainland immediately through March 27. 

Delta and United will suspend services starting on February 6, and Delta's suspension would last through April 30. United said it expected to resume operations on March 28. 

"I planned a trip with my family to the US in early February but was recently informed that my flight with Delta was canceled due to the epidemic," a Changsha-based white-collar worker surnamed Cai told the Global Times on Sunday.

"It's kind of a pity but what matters now is to combat the viral epidemic and we also respect the airline's decision," she said.

Chinese tourists account for nearly 65 percent of the people who travel between China and the US. During the entry ban period, the US tourism sector will lose money because of the absence of Chinese visitors, Lin Zhijie, an independent industry analyst based in Xiamen, East China's Fujian Province, told the Global Times on Sunday.

The US tourism sector can earn around $250 billion each year from global visitors and Chinese travelers can contribute $20 billion to the country, Lin estimated. 

Qi Qi, a Guangzhou-based industry observer, agreed, saying that the ban would largely affect people-to-people exchanges between China and the US in the short term.

Traveling between China and the US will remain suspended until the US lifts entry restrictions after control of the new viral epidemic, Qi told the Global Times on Sunday.

Delta currently operates 42 weekly flights between China and the US, including daily flights from Beijing to Detroit and Seattle, and between Shanghai and Atlanta, Detroit, Los Angeles and Seattle, according to media reports. 

American ordinarily operates 28 weekly flights to the mainland, including flights from Dallas and Los Angeles to both Beijing and Shanghai. Experts said that as US airlines have increased their focus on services with China, the suspension would also "harm" the American airlines' revenue during this special period.

Lin said apart from the major US airlines, some Chinese carriers such as Air China, China Southern Airlines and China Eastern Airlines have operated flights between the two countries, but the number of visitors to the US will largely drop in coming days amid the virus outbreak.

Chinese authorities announced the cancelation of all group travel from the mainland on January 27. Also, other foreign airlines such as British Airways, Qantas Airways, Air New Zealand, Egyptair and Turkish Airlines have halted flight services to mainland airports. 

Due to the viral epidemic, more than 4,000 flights (including round-trip flights) have been cancelled or suspended in February, accounting for more than 15 percent of the total number of all inbound and outbound flights, according to data released by Chinese online travel service provider qunar.com. 

More than 2,200 flights were cancelled by domestic airlines, and more than 1,900 flights were cancelled by overseas airlines, the data showed.