Field hospital for migrants with suspected Covid-19
The measure will improve security during the pandemic
THE REGIONAL government has identified a temporary use for the field hospital which was constructed in Alicante city at the height of the coronavirus pandemic in April.
Councillor for justice and the interior Gabriela Bravo said it will house migrants who arrive in boats from North Africa ‘in order to control possible outbreaks of Covid-19’.
The field hospital will have to be ceded to the national government to do this.
Sra Bravo assured that this will guarantee that the migrants have a safe place to stay and the measure will also improve security. The facility, which stands next to the city’s general hospital, will take groups of migrants ‘amongst whom cases of Covid-19 have been detected’.
They will all be given PCR tests and any that are found to have coronavirus will be ‘transferred to the corresponding hospital’ or treated in situ.
The remainder of the group will remain at the field hospital to undergo a period of quarantine.
Sra Bravo explained that the measure had been studied and approved at a meeting in Valencia, which was attended by regional president Ximo Puig, health councillor Ana Barceló, government delegate Gloria Calero, and representatives of the security forces and the Red Cross.
The number of illegal migrants who make the journey to Spain increases at this time of year and ‘this summer people who have coronavirus may arrive in the boats’.
Sra Bravo noted that it was very difficult to trace Covid-19 cases amongst migrants and this measure would help ‘to control their movements’.
The field hospital contains 240 beds, which are divided up into different modules.
It was specially designed for Covid-19 with ‘anti-virus’ surfaces and other facilities such as air-conditioning and a sewage system.