COVID-19 easing as deaths pass 2.2 million, cases hit 103 million
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People crowd the Darsena area, in Milan, Italy, on Sunday. The city of Milan and its surrounding Lombardy region will enter the yellow zone with the lowest level of restrictions as Monday. In yellow zones, shops are allowed to open, and restaurants and bars can serve customers until 6 p.m., after which time they can only do takeaway and delivery services. Photo by Matteo Corner/EPA/EFE
Jan. 31 (UPI) The coronavirus pandemic, which has claimed more than 2.2 million lives and sickened at least 103 people worldwide, is subsiding from record levels as nations have enacted restrictions, including lockdowns, and are ramping up vaccinations.
Spain is facing another debate about face masks. At the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, Spanish health authorities did not recommend the use of face masks, partly because there were not enough to supply everyone. One year on, non-medical face masks continue to be allowed, even though health experts say they are not safe, given what is now known about how the virus is spread, and the emergence of new, more contagious strains, such as the B.1.1.7 variant detected in the United Kingdom. But if FFP2 masks â theoretically the most effective at stopping the virus â were mandatory, it is not likely that there would be sufficient capacity to produce this level of supply, according to the Association of Personal Protective Equipment Companies (Asepal).
The monitoring system has reflected this duality in the past: when the number of new coronavirus cases reaches a peak and starts to fall, the number of Covid-19 fatalities still takes time before it starts to descend. That is just what can be seen in the data supplied by the Spanish Health Ministry on Tuesday.
The number of diagnoses â which include those from previous days, and not just the last 24 hours â came in at 36,435 according to yesterdayâs report, the same level seen a week ago and far from the 44,357 reported on Thursday, January 21. It is a clear signal that, as the director of the Health Ministryâs Coordination Center for Health Alerts (CCAES) Fernando Simón said on Thursday, the new wave has now arrived at a plateau and should soon start to fall.
Spainâs central Health Ministry reported 93,822 new coronavirus infections on Monday, as well as adding 767 fatalities to the overall death toll. The figures, which account for Friday, Saturday and Sunday, represent new record highs â for the entire pandemic in the former case, and for this third wave of the crisis in the latter.
Presenting the figures on Monday evening, Fernando Simón, the director of the Health Ministryâs Coordination Center for Health Alerts (CCAES), warned that Spain must âurgentlyâ relieve the pressure on the countryâs hospitals and intensive care units (ICUs), which are in a âcritical situation.â
The only good news that could be found from Simónâs presentation last night was that the country is likely to have reached the peak of this third wave on January 17, and since then the number of new cases is falling slowly â delays in notifications from the regional healthcare systems mean that there is a lag in
Spanish regions such as Andalusia, Catalonia and Madrid are wasting thousands of doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine by not injecting patients with the sixth dose contained in the vials. Since January 8, when the European Medicines Agency granted authorization, the five initial doses contained in the vials are now officially six, increasing the number of potential recipients.
But this change has not been exploited by a number of Spainâs territories, who are in charge of their own vaccination campaigns. Speaking on Thursday in the regional parliament, Andalusiaâs health chief Jesús Aguirre admitted that this was the case. âYou could take out up to five doses and there was a wee drop left, and that little bit is used to administer that sixth dose,â he said. âBut we are talking about 20% more vaccinations.â