ARCHIVED - Highest daily Covid death toll since March with 205 more fatalities

Coronavirus Incidence rates fall again across Spain but the pandemic is far from over

While the health authorities in Spain wait anxiously to see whether the end of the national state of emergency on Saturday night brings about an increase in coronavirus case numbers, the latest Ministry of Health update which was made public on Tuesday afternoon shows another improvement in the overall situation, with incidence rates and hospital and ICU patient numbers all continuing to show a steady decrease.

After 4,941 new cases were confirmed the 14-day accumulated Covid incidence rate now stands at 180.7 cases per 100,000 inhabitants, having fallen from a fourth-wave peak of over 230 a couple of weeks ago, and only 4 of the country’s 17 regions remain above the “extreme risk” threshold (the Basque Country, Madrid, Navarra and Aragón). At the other end of the scale, the Comunidad Valenciana is still the only region considered to be at “low risk”, with a rate of 34.6, but there are 6 more with figures of under 100 (Murcia, Extremadura, Galicia, the Canaries, the Balearics and Asturias).

At the same time, the proportion of hospital beds occupied by coronavirus patients has dipped to 6.47 per cent and the equivalent figure in intensive care units is down to 20.5 per cent (although it is still over 40 per cent in the region of Madrid).

However, although these key indicators indicate progress in combating the pandemic, and despite the fact that the vaccination campaign is continuing apace, there were unfortunately a further 205 Covid-related deaths reported in the latest bulletin, taking the official Ministry toll since the pandemic began to 79,100. Not since late March had the daily death toll exceeded 200, and this serves to underline the fact that the Covid-19 crisis is far from over.