Covid infections continue to rise and deaths see sharp uptick

The Ministry of Health has announced that there are 13,441,941 confirmed cases of Covid 19 infection in Spain, an increase of 10,843 since the last update on Tuesday. In that last update the increase was 8,114, and last Friday the increase was 10,721, thus Covid infections are continuing an upward trend.

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In addition, the Ministry report that a total of 114,468 deaths from Covid have occurred in the Friday update, an increase of 206 since Tuesday, when the increase was 83. The increase is also higher than the 95 reported last Friday. Therefore, this week, there have been 289 deaths recorded, compared to the 170 last week.

As a direct result of the increases, the wearing of masks on public transport, including planes, is to remain mandatory, at least for a few more weeks. The experts from the Ministry of Health have decided to postpone the end of this restriction, the last of the pandemic, due to the “upward trend”, of infections and the accumulated incidence, as detailed by Minister Carolina Darias in the press conference after the Interterritorial Council, which was held this Friday in Santiago de Compostela.

Darias has highlighted that the regional councillors have not even addressed this debate at today’s meeting. «It has not come out, it has not been the subject of comment nor was it on the agenda. None of the directors has raised it because we all agreed at the time that the experts would continue advising on making these decisions,” Darias assured.

In recent weeks, several autonomous communities had called on the minister to put an end to the mandatory mask on public transport, although earlier this week only Madrid and Murcia maintained this stance. Darias argued that the experts had not prepared a report on this possibility. Now there is a report, but the answer is negative. «The Alerts Report has met recently and has concluded that we must continue waiting for the moment. We are on an upward trend, it is true that it is slight and without hospital impact for now, but the conference has said that it wants to continue evaluating it,” Darias stressed.

According to the update of the covid-19 data carried out by Health this Friday, the incidence in those over 60 years of age has increased 13 points since Tuesday to stand at 168 cases per 100,000 inhabitants at 14 days. But Darias stressed that this growth does not have an impact on hospital occupancy, which is “the lowest in the entire pandemic.”

In her appearance, the minister has also announced that some autonomies are going to begin to cite those over 60 years of age so that they can soon receive the fourth dose of the covid vaccine. The Ministry, however, will wait to approve the vaccination with this second booster shot to those under that age. “It will be the Public Health Commission that will decide if it is extended to more groups,” she asserted.