Date Published: 05/07/2021
ARCHIVED - First fatality in Murcia region for nearly two weeks: Covid update Monday July 5
ARCHIVED ARTICLE The number of hospital patients has risen sharply in the last 24 hour period
The latest Covid update given by the regional health authorities of the Murcia region were published on Monday July 5, and relate to the period concluding at midnight on Sunday July 4.
Unfortunately, one fatality has been reported, a 63-year-old woman from the Mar Menor area (Health Area VIII Mar Menor) who contracted the virus in February, breaking the run of 12 consecutive days without deaths and taking the total in the region since the pandemic began up to 1,608.
Health personnel carried out 1,235 PCR and antigen tests within this 24 hour period, yielding a positivity rate of 4.1% and detecting 51 new Covid contagions.
The number of new detections on a Sunday is always low as so few tests are carried out, but 51 is considerably higher than the levels detected in the past month, and gives an indication that infection levels are higher at the moment than they have been for some time.
Of the total cases, 9 correspond to the municipality of Cartagena, 9 to Murcia, 6 to Los Alcázares, 6 to Torre Pacheco, 3 to Molina de Segura, 2 to Alcantarilla, 2 to Cieza, 2 to Jumilla and 2 to Mazarrón, with the remainder spread around the region in smaller quantities.
The main point of interest in these latest figures is the sharp rise in hospitalisations over the weekend.
On Friday there were 20 people receiving hospital treatment for more severe cases of Covid, which was a similar level to August last year, but over the weekend there has been a sharp rise in admissions, and there are now 33 people hospitalized in the Region, with 7 in intensive care.
This all adds up to 771 active cases, with 738 people in home isolation.
A total of 54 people were given the all-clear on Sunday after having previously given a positive test, bringing the total number of recoveries to 112,916.
The Covid rate is soaring across Spain, but Murcia continues to present one of the lowest levels of Covid diagnoses amongst Spain’s 17 regions. According to the latest update on Friday (the weekend figures are due out on Monday evening), the highest figures are to be found in Catalunya (297) and Cantabria (242), with the former having climbed above the “extreme risk” threshold of 250, and in consequence both have been placed on the list of “high risk” travel destinations by the national government of Germany on Monday.
At the other end of the scale are Ceuta (23.7), Castilla-La Mancha (59), the Region of Murcia (68) and Galicia (72), but in all of these areas the latest figures show an upward trajectory.
The Murcian regional president, Fernando López Miras, said on Monday that "any possibilities are on the table" in reference to potentially new measures in the event that coronavirus infections "get out of control."
Image: Vaccination campaign in Alhama de Murcia