Spain deaths pass China as virus ravages Europe
THE coronavirus death toll in Spain has shot up by more than 700, surpassing China and making the country second only to Italy as the pandemic spread rapidly in Europe.
Spain recorded a record daily increase of 738 deaths, pushing it to 3,434 overall and past China’s 3,285, the Ministry of Health said.
The country’s infections rose by 20% to 47,610, and more than 5,000 have recovered.
Spain’s health system is overwhelmed, with hotels being converted into hospitals and a Madrid ice rink being used as a temporary morgue.
Legislators are set to extend the country’s lockdown for two more weeks, to April 12.
Fernando Simon, head of Spain’s health emergency co-ordination centre, said he hoped the numbers would peak soon.
“If we are not already at the peak, we are very close,” he said. “I cannot say that we have reached it.”
Even once the numbers crest, it would be “counterproductive” to think about relaxing restrictions soon, he added.
Spain’s nursing home system has been hit particularly hard. Prosecutors are investigating several homes after troops disinfecting them discovered elderly people living among suspected coronavirus victims who had died.
Media reported that 23 residents of a Madrid retirement home had died from Covid-19 or symptoms related to the new virus, news reports said. The residence released a statement saying it had been pleading for more staff and supplies, including virus tests, after 55 of its workers had been forced to take medical leave.
National police also arrested two people in southern Spain for throwing stones and other debris at a convoy of ambulances and police vehicles as 28 elderly people were being transferred from a nursing home with a high number of infections to another facility in their town.
Italy has been the hardest-hit nation in Europe with more than 69,000 infections and 6,800 deaths.
Germany’s parliament is set to approve a series of measures that will allow the government to offer aid totalling more than a trillion euros (£900bn) for the country of 83 million people.
Health minister Jens Spahn said
Germany has about 1,000 Covid-19 patients in intensive care and its health system can cope with the numbers for now.
Germany has the fifth-largest number of infections in the world – well over 30,000 – but officials say relatively wide testing has picked up a lot of mild cases, and the death rate has been low compared with southern Europe. Germany has 172 deaths, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.
More than 428,000 people worldwide have been infected by the virus and more than 19,000 have died, according to Johns Hopkins University. Overall, more than 109,000 have recovered.
Meanwhile, Several major airlines have no spare seats to bring UK passengers home from Spain this week, it has been claimed.
Consumer group Which? said travellers wanting to leave the UK’s most popular holiday destination before it closes hotels on Thursday night as part of a coronavirus shutdown are unable to book flights with Ryanair, easyJet and Jet2.
The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) is urging all British travellers to return to the UK as soon as possible, warning that further closures to air routes may occur without notice.
Last week Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said as many as almost one million British nationals could be travelling abroad.
Rory Boland, editor of Which? Travel magazine, said: “While it’s right British travellers are being urged to return to the UK, the reality is that there are now thousands of UK residents stranded in dozens of different destinations with no means to get back.”