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article_detail
Date Published: 16/04/2020
ARCHIVED - Thursday Covid cases Spain: 5,183 new cases in the last 24 hours
Total cases Spain: 182,816
Total deaths: 19,130
Total recovered : 74,797
Image: The Military Emergencies Unit continue to work across Spain assisting local authorities in a multitude of tasks, in this case disinfection sparaying.
Thursday is proving to be a day of conflicting information and although the official statistics published by the Ministry of Health are those most widely quoted as the most reliable source of information, developments today have highlighted doubts as to the veracity of the official figures.
Health Ministry figures cite the number of new cases as being 5,183 ( an increase of 2,9% as compared to an increase of 7% last week), bringing the national total to 182.816. This is the second consecutive day of what can only be called substantial increases, following 5,092 new cases yesterday, although the rise is being attributed not to an INCREASE in the number of actual cases, but rather to the extended rapid testing programme which has begun in the autonomous communities this week, so therefore, the increase is due to the number of REPORTED cases being higher.
Hope that makes sense!
The number of deaths in the last 24 hours is 551, just above the 523 reported on Wednesday, bringing the overall total to 19,130, and although this remains a significant figure, the rate of increase is lower than last week and appears to indicate a pattern of stabilisation (or that flattening of the curve UK journalists are so desperate to see).
The most encouraging figure is the number of those recovering from the virus which has increased by 3,944 in the last 24 hours to bring the new total of recovered cases to 74,797.
Spokesman Fernando Simón, head of the centre of co-ordination for alerts and sanitary emergencies, stressed today during his presentation yet again that the rise in new cases had been anticipated due to the new rapid testing programme being undertaken in the 17 Autonomous Communities, and that 1312 of the 5138 new cases are “asymptomatic”, ie cases in which the subject has been tested but has not shown any actual symptoms and have been “discovered” as a result of the testing programme.
He also recognised that confirming the true number of cases in Spain “would be very difficult”.
We have reported many times that the true number of cases is believed to be ten times higher than the actual number of cases, and many studies indicate that there is a significant discrepancy between the official figures and the “real figures”, the true extent of which will probably never be known in spite of the new programme of epidemiological study in the 17 Autonomous communities which uses rapid tester kits to ascertain how many people have actually been infected. The Health Ministry believes that 5% of the population will test positive, which means that 2.3 million people have actually been contagious at some point, a far cry from the figures currently being reported.
To date Spain has undertaken 930,230 PCR tests nationally (the slower method used to test for Covid-positives, NOT the new rapid tests which test for antibodies) and prior to Semana Santa was carrying out around 20,000 tests daily, whereas the test levels have now risen to around 40-47,000 daily, hence the increase in new cases.
However, this is where it starts to get really complicated.
Today it has been highlighted that the Health Ministry and the Madrid and Cataluña regions are reporting completely different figures for the number of cases and deaths due to differing methods of accounting.
On Wednesday the regional government of Catalunya announced that the coronavirus death toll in the region was not 3,855, as the Ministry of Health had reported, but 7,097 – a sudden increase of 85 per cent.
The addition of 3,242 fatalities to the statistics is the result of adopting a more complete way of compiling the data, and not of a sudden surge of deaths. Previously the only Covid-related deaths reported were those which occurred in hospitals and other medical facilities, but now more information has been gathered regarding those who have died in old people’s residences or in their own homes through funeral parlours and the civil registry.
It is also reported in Catalunya that the number of cases of coronavirus, which had been reported as being 36,505, is actually 94,832: in this case the huge difference is due to untested patients with virus-like symptoms being included, although of course the “extra” cases are only “probables”.
In Madrid the official figures are 50,694 with 6,877 fatalities, but the vice-president of the Madrid Region has said that once the figures of deaths in care homes and homes for the elderly are taken into consideration, the real numbers of deaths are well in excess of 11,000 in this one region alone.
However, the Health Minister, Salvador Illa, has refused to take these deaths into consideration when producing the official figures, saying that the government is following the guidelines of the WHO for calculating the number of deaths and is only taking into consideration “individuals who have been positively diagnosed with Covid-19.”
This means that the figures being put forward by the government ONLY take into consideration those who have been tested and do NOT include those who have died without a formal test having been undertaken. Already many cases have been reported of the deceased being recorded as dying of pneumonia, when in fact the real cause of death has been Covid-19 and of course, many of these deaths reported today in Cataluña were not tested for Covid-19 at the time of death due to the lack of tester kits. Most probably, these deaths will never be included in the official figures.
Although at some point in the future analyses of the figures recorded in the Civil Registries of Spain will indicate the percentage of deaths over and above those normally recorded at this time of year as being “probable Covid-19 deaths”, the offices are currently facing a crisis of their own, with a huge backlog of bureaucratic paperwork holding up the death certificate processes; this will gradually ease as the cases diminish.
All of this is not to say that the rise in cases is only due to the new testing (see the article entitled “More extensive testing in Spain causes increase in reported coronavirus cases” for a more rounded explanation which does include other possible factors.
Again, it is important to stress that none of this means that the coronavirus lockdown is not working, or that the virus has found a way to beat it. The news is unwelcome, of course, but it is merely the result of more cases and fatalities being detected – most of them after the event, necessitating a sudden adjustment of the statistics.
Readers may find an article published today about a study claiming that the lockdown in Spain has reduced contagion by 80 per cent of interest, as it helps to make us all feel better about the sacrifices being made by millions of people in so many ways to try and prevent the spread of the virus, and justify the lockdown.
Above all, these figures vindicate the decision to maintain the lockdown and for all of us to take sensible precautions when venturing out for shopping, simple precautions such as wearing a mask and gloves, maintaining social distancing and respecting the desire of other people to do the same.
As if 19,130 deaths to date isn´t sufficient justification!
Remember: LOCKDOWN MEANS LOCKDOWN. STAY AT HOME. STAY SAFE AND DO YOUR BIT TO REDUCE THE SPREAD OF CORONAVIRUS.
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