At the start of the weekend the Valencian Community registered 457 new coronavirus infections overnight confirmed by PCR tests, which puts the total number of positives at 19,122 people. There were 120 in the province of Alicante equalling 6,065 in total.
Authorities also announced new outbreaks of coronavirus in the Vega Baja at the start of the weekend. The update confirms a new outbreak of contagion in Orihuela with 16 cases of a work origin, while another outbreak in the municipality of Algorfa with 4 infections of a social origin. The Orihuela outbreak is one of the largest registered in the Valencian Community but information on the place of origin has not been provided.
This came hot on the heels of Fernando Simon’s “things are not going well” speech. Fernando Simon, the health ministry’s emergencies director, urged social media influencers to help make young people in particular aware of the ongoing danger of contamination.
“Nobody should be in any doubt, things are not going well… We cannot let the situation elude us again,” Simon told a press conference, warning of the dangers of a rebound in cases which Spain has seen in recent weeks.
Many of the new cases are asymptomatic with the number of hospitalised sufferers as well as fatalities well down on the spring peaks.
Simon stressed the main risk was that hospitals could find themselves overwhelmed with admissions if the number of cases keeps rising.
Spain’s counts 130 virus cases per 100,000 people, a much higher level than that of its EU neighbours — the figure for France being 43 and just 17 in Germany according to an AFP tally based on official data.
Spain has regularly been registering between 6,000 and 8,000 cases a day and the past week has seen 122 virus deaths, compared with 12 in the final week of July, for an official total toll of 28,813.