Date Published: 04/01/2021
ARCHIVED - Spain notifies 30,579 new Covid-19 positives since Thursday evening
ARCHIVED ARTICLE
There have been 241 deaths from coronavirus since midnight on Thursday, New Year’s Eve
With a weekend of holidays now out of the way, the Spanish Health Ministry has reported 30,579 new Covid-19 positives, bringing the total number of cases diagnosed to date up to 1,958,844.
The 241 deaths reported across the weekend bring the fatalities total up to 51,078.
1,923 patients have been admitted to hospital, increasing hospital occupancy to 11.2% and that of UCI intensive care units to 23%.
According to data from the Health Ministry, which has reported a decrease in the accumulated incidence across 14 days of 7.29 points to 272.22 cases of covid per 100,000 inhabitants, this Monday there are 13,458 patients admitted.
For the Minister of Health, Salvador Illa, these figures indicate that the pandemic in Spain continues to grow and we cannot lower our guard in the coming weeks or relax measures.
Illa made these statements at a press conference after participating in the meeting of the Interterritorial Health Commission in which he analyzed the evolution of the pandemic with the health authorities of the 17 regional governments, pointing out that several of the autonomous communities have already increased restrictions within the last few hours and that others intend do so within the next few days. "All of the representatives have expressed their concern about the evolution of the pandemic," said the minister, while warning that although the data on the evolution of the covid "shows a decrease today, there are notification delays which are expected to show a further upward tendency ".
For this reason, the director of the Center for the Coordination of Health Alerts and Emergencies of the Ministry of Health (CCAES), María José Sierra, has warned that "for several days there may not be a precise assessment" of the impact that Christmas has had in contagions.
This Monday the highest hospital pressure in the UCI units continues to be in Catalonia, with 35.51% occupancy (34.10% on December 31) which has today annouced the confinement of all municipalities within the region from Thursday onwards; followed by the Balearic Islands, with 34.59% (30.48%); Valencia Region, with 34.04% (29.25%); Madrid, with 29.56% (25.65%) which has today applied new restrictions to several health areas, Castilla-La Mancha, with 26.85% (26.05%), and Castilla y León, with 27.29 (25.92%). The accumulated incidence, which on the last day of December stood at 279.51 cases, has dropped to 272.22, although Sierra has stated that this figure will be "adjusted" in the coming days and recalled that "it was below the 200 mark around December 10-12th. " Dr. Sierra also highlighted the increase in tests with a positive diagnosis, which in the "first days of December was 7.5% while at the end of the month it has settled around 10.06%.
There is no hiding from the fact that the low number of tests undertaken in the last few days is hiding the true growth of the pandemic during the festive season (more than 20% less tests were carried out last week than in the week before across Spain, representing 204,000 less tests than in the previous week) but there is an uneasy sense of calm before the storm as the country prepares for the “Noche de Roscón” tomorrow evening as families gather for one last time this festive season, waiting for the Three Kings to bring their gifts, and the Bank Holiday following on the 6th.
And then the health authorities will wait for the new contagions to roll into their hospitals.