Murcia Today Weekly Bulletin 21st November

Covid Spain:

Covid continues to influence the news this week, with virtually all of Spain confined within regional borders and movement limited as much as possible, but the measures are starting to bear fruit and this week there has been a noticeable decline in new cases across the country.

Worldwide, the virus is continuing its harvest; this morning the John Hopkins University reported another record number of new cases for a 24 hour period worldwide; 665,000 for the last 24 hours, taking the total worldwide up to 57.5 million, with 1,372,274 fatalities. More than 36.8 million people have recovered worldwide and across Europe;  this week there have been signs of the virus abating, but in some countries such as the US, the figures remain sobering; 195,000 new cases in 24 hours, a record for the pandemic, 11.9 million cases and 254,424 fatalities. Spain is currently in 6th place, with its 1.55 million cases and 42,619 deaths, followed by the UK with 1.47 million cases and 54,381 deceased.

On Tuesday this week Spain passed the one and a half million infections mark, a level that only five other countries with much larger populations have reached ; United States, India, Brazil, France and Russia. It took just 27 days, from October 21st to November 17th, to add half a million positives to the running total, averaging more than 18,500 new infected every day.

Spain:

This Friday, 20th November, the national Ministry of Health reported 15,156 new cases of Covid-19, which is a large decrease in the daily total compared to the 21,371 for Friday published last week and reflects a week in which the number of new cases has gradually reduced.

The overall total this Friday is 1,556,730, compared to the1,458,591 of last Friday, which makes the weekly total 98,139, and the average 14, 019 a day, a noticeable fall compared to the 129,759 reported last week. This marks two consecutive weeks of falling figures, compared to the peak of the second wave at 143,154 the week before. So this is clearly an improving situation.

This gradual fall in the number of new cases being reported has reduced the accumulated incidence rate over the last 14 days, calculated based on the number of cases per 100,000 inhabitants, which today stands at 419, compared to 498 last Friday. 

By region, this is the current AI level across the country per 100,000 of population over 14 days, the worst affected being Castilla y León and the Basque Country:

Ceuta 690; Melilla with 571 (both of these enclaves on the African coastline); Castilla y León 769; Basque Country 690; Asturias 623; La Rioja, 609; Aragón, 606;   Murcia 556; Cantabria 521; Andalucía 507; Navarra 440; Catalonia 393; Extremadura 393; Castilla la Mancha 430; Valencia Region 299; Galicia 286; Madrid 285; (the two sets of offshore islands) Balearic Islands 225; Canary Islands 79.

The rate has come down this week in every region except Asturias and Cantabria. Yesterday Madrid, the worst affected region just a  few weeks ago, achieved a major milestone when it became the region with the lowest AI rate in the country, showing that the strict confinement imposed by the government and subsequent confinment of areas with high cases has worked.

The gradual decrease does permit some optimism, but the objectives of the Ministry of Health, reducing the accumulated incidence over 14 days to 60 cases, and over 7 days to 25, is still a distant target.

Fatalities:

The image shows that although deaths are increasing steadily, they are way below the levels of the spring.

The week has concluded with a total of 42,619 fatalities, compared to 40,769, a rise of 1,850.

Although the number of new cases has eased off slightly, we are now seeing the effects of the rise in previous weeks working their way through, as logically new infections rise first, followed by a rise in hospitalisations and then finally, the number of deaths rise, a process that usually takes 2-3 weeks.

Three weeks ago the Ministry notified a weekly total of 1,126, 1,355 the following week and 1,936 last week, so this week the number of deaths is slightly lower, even though the 435 reported on Tuesday was the largest number of this second wave.
 

Pressure on hospital system:
Logically, the pressure exerted on the health system by this level of cases remains high, but the situation has improved slightly this week nationally on the general covid wards, and remained almost the same in intensive care; Last week there were 20,239 patients hospitalised with more severe cases of covid; this week the total has fallen to 17,963.

Last Friday the bed occupancy was 16.15 %, this Friday it is 14.52%, reflecting a very slight easing on hospital services.

In intensive care units, the situation has remained almost the same; The national average for ICU beds last Friday was 31.75%; this Friday it's 31.02%, with  3.054 patients in a serious condition on Friday.

So all of these figures show a slight easing of pressure and an improvement in the situation compared to last week.

Restrictions:

Puente de la Constitución and Christmas.

There is a generalised feeling of optimism about the slowly improving situation in Spain, but at the same time, the medical profession in particular is warning against complacency, against relieving restrictions too early and against the possibility of a "third wave" of the virus breaking out after the festive season.

Although there are strict restrictions right across the country, there are still many problems with the public failing to respect them and police continue fining those who refuse to wear a mask, break the curfews and continue to hold private parties and gatherings. Just a couple of examples from many possibles this week right across the country;

Mazarrón police catch a  dozen people drinking in botellón gathering during curfew; Click to read

52 incidents in Alicante this weekend breaking curfew and failing to comply with restrictions: Click to read

And acts of vandalism: Man arrested after several nights of bin and car burning in Murcia city: Click to read

Representatives of young people have complained this week that the young are being unfairly blamed for the disorder which has occurred in some cities and stigmatised by the pandemic, saying that many groups of young people have been participating in voluntary acts, community initiatives and have done everything possible to comply with the regulations. But some feel the restrictions and penalties don´t go far enough! One story this week relates to a situation which arose in Zamora;

Parents of fined partygoers in Zamora request community service for their offspring: 3,000-euro fines have been paid by all those attending an August macro-fiesta but their parents want extra punishment; A party which was held in the countryside of Zamora in western Spain between 7th and 9th August has resulted in 91 fines of 3,000 euros being imposed on the parents of young people who attended, as well as a fine of 126,000 euros which was dished out to the organizer of the event, but in addition some of the parents have now requested that their offspring be obliged to perform some kind of social work as in most cases, it’s the parents of the youngsters who have been obliged to pay the fines, not the perpetrators themselves and they believe a lesson needs to be learnt!.Click to read full story

Puente de la Concepción and Christmas Holidays:

This week the Spanish media has been filled with content about the forthcoming Bank Holiday weekend of the Puente de la Concepción and the subsequent Christmas festivities.

This year the main day of the Bank Holiday falls on Sunday December 6th, so in most regions its holiday has been moved to Monday 7th December and is a Bank Holiday in the following areas of Spain: Andalusia, Aragon, Asturias, Balearic Islands, Canary Islands, Castilla y León, Extremadura, Madrid, Murcia, Navarra and La Rioja, as well as in the Autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla. December the 8th is a national holiday everywhere, so it is normal for families to take a short break around these dates. This normally involves going to the coast, a ski resort or rural house for a few days.

It’s widely expected that most autonomous regional governments will decide to keep their "borders" closed to prevent the population moving around the country and this week the closures have already begun.The Valencia Region announced this week that it would be maintaining its perimeter border until at least the 9th December, after the holiday, as have Castilla La Mancha (which borders with Madrid, Valencia, Andalucia and Murcia), Asturias, Cantabria, Basque Country and Navarra. On Thursday evening the Region of Murcia was added to this list (Murcia extends external border restrictions and internal municipal movement restrictions until 9th December: Click to read)

Perimeter confinement of the Valencia Region will continue until December 9th: Click to read

Then on Friday, Madrid announced that it too would be closing its external borders from the 4th to the 14th December to stop movement, a decision welcomed by other regions of Spain in which many families own holiday properties which they habitually visit during these festivities: Click to read

The next concern is the Christmas season, which is very long in Spain, providing lots of potential opportunities for contagions between family members. Festivities start on Christmas Eve, 24th December and continue until the 6th January and Three Kings.

The Inter-Territorial Health Committee decided this Wednesday to create a special group of experts in order to come up with recommendations for the festive season which will meet next week, but the Minister for Health, Salvador Illa, has already warned that the lifting of restrictions before time is not an option. Click to read full article

“Nobody, nobody at all, has talked about relaxing the restrictions or suggested that the battle has been won”, he said.

There have already been a significant amount of Christmas cancellations, with Three Kings Parades suspended in many major cities and although councils are keen to put up their lights and inject a little festive cheer, seasonal entertainments programmes are expected to err on the side of caution as the whole country is keen to avoid a third wave of covid after the Christmas celebrations.

If you are thinking of travelling to Spain over the festive season, it’s highly advisable to wait a few more days and see what the conclusions are before booking flights, and also to consider the potential situation in the UK or other “home country” as should the current situation not improve, the existing travel ban for non-essential journeys from England for example, may remain in place.

Bars and restaurants:

Another topic which has obsessed the media this week is the closure and re-opening of bars and restaurants. It's a difficult topic as it is widely accepted that the hostelry sector creates opportunities for contagion and encourages people to interact, which is totally contrary to the movement restrictions, but at the same time, we're human and we need social contact to maintain mental health. The sector has been highly vocal in demanding the right to trade and has been given considerably more aid than some business sectors, which is starting to jar with other sectors, particularly retailers, who are having a very difficult time due to the movement restrictions.

A lot of town halls are starting campaigns to try and persuade shoppers to support their local retailers in the very important Christmas run-up, but words must be chosen carefully as was clearly demonstrated in Barcelona this week; Mayoress Ada Colau was attending a presentation with the regional business association and used the opportunity to make a speech urging shoppers to support local retailers, and NOT to buy online from major retailers such as Amazon. Click to read:Mayoress of Barcelona urges residents NOT to buy online from Amazon

Amazon  responded in a statement that "it works with more than 2,000 small businesses and merchants in Catalonia, which leads the ranking of communities with more small companies that sell" in their stores and pointed out that the small companies in Catalonia that sell on the platform, "are the second that export the most from Spain and registered international sales of more than 100 million euros in 2019 in Amazon stores ".

The company also has a Software Development Center in Barcelona "that employs engineers, software developers, data scientists and experts in machine learning and cloud storage, as well as a support center for SMEs in Southern Europe" , and in Catalonia, the delivery platform has 3 logistics centers in El Prat, Martorelles and Castellbisbal; an urban logistics center in Barcelona that offers fast deliveries through Prime Now, a distribution center in Barberá del Vallés and 3 logistics stations located in Barcelona, Martorelles and Rubí.

All of which contribute significantly to the economy of the Catalan region and Barcelona and reflect the change in buying habits from the high street to online shopping.

This will be emphasised even further this next week when Black Friday shopping hits an all-time high.

Black Friday online boom anticipated in Spain this year due to Covid-19: Spanish consumers are expected to make significantly more Black Friday purchases this year than in previous years due to the coronavirus restrictions, the insecurity caused by COVID-19 in making Christmas purchases in physical stores, to compensate for the feelings stemming from confinement, because families have saved money this summer, because economic insecurity increases the need to save money by shopping for bargains, as well as because new markets, such as the older generation, have become used to buying online during lockdown. Click to read the full article

There are also many measures being offered to help the bars and restaurants sector and to help them re-opening.

On Monday Catalunya is re-opening its bars and restaurants with restrictions following acrimonious protests from the hostelry sector after a month of closure, as well as easing restrictions on cultural events cinemas etc as the situation has improved considerably from a month ago. But other regions are taking a different approach and in Galicia, which has one of the lowest AI rates in the whole country, the regional government has intensified its restrictions and is confining further municipalities and closing down bars and restaurants in these areas as it has seen that the measures are working and the covid rate has come down considerably. This regional government has refused to close its external borders, but has focused on confining specific municipalities with problems, and has achieved great success, so its logic is that if it works, do it again and keep doing it until the virus is under control.

In the Murcia region the government has decided to create a completely new 4-tiered (and very complicated) de-escalation structure and will decide every Monday which of its 45 municipalities meet the criteria is has established for entering into each phase.Each of these phases also include changes to the percentage of people allowed into cultural events and cinemas and other changes which affect the local councils more than the residents, but the core of the structure is the re-opening of bars and restauarants which will be permitted only in the municipalities which have met AI rate targets over a 2 week period.Click for full article

There are 2 levels of re-opening permitted, but only the external terraces of these hostelries are allowed to re-open and no service at the bar or inside of the premises is permitted.

Full distancing between tables must be maintained and the number of 6 diners at a table remains in place. Masks must be worn when not engaged in the act of eating or sipping a drink.

The three municipalities in which hostelries are permitted to open to 100% of their terrace capacity are; Águilas, Ulea and Ojós.

The municipalities in which terraces may open to 75% capacity are; Abarán, Beniel, Cartagena, Lorquí, Santomera, Pliego and Molina de Segura

The situation in each municipality will be assessed individually on a Monday morning and decisions made every week based on the accumulated incidence rate per 100,000 of population and a number of other factors.

This means that some municipalities MAY be able to re-open next week, amongst them Mazarrón, but others have little chance next week as their figures are too high.

Of course, this means that some residents are going to be tempted to sneak across internal municipal borders, but bear in mind that the restrictions on moving between municipalities remain in place until December 9th, so “border hopping for a beer” is still a fineable offence IF you are caught.

However, there has been a big problem with lack of local police resources to monitor every single back road between municipalities, so although it would be very easy for residents of the Puerto de Mazarrón to drive along to La Azohía which is in Cartagena and where bars are permitted to open, or take the back road and go into the Águilas municipality, whether they are able to do so depends entirely on the enthusiasm of the local police to mount checkpoints on the exit roads. On Saturday morning not one policeman was sighted during a fairly extensive shopping drive-out in spite of the national government delegate in the region advising that increased roadblocks would be in place this weekend.

Some councils are very unhappy that their bars haven´t been allowed to open; this Saturday the hostelry sector of Lorca was out in force protesting in the streets, organisations representing the sector have been very vocal in their demands for the bars in the interior of the region to re-open and in Murcia city the sector is furious after cancelling a planned demonstration last week when the regional government agreed to pay compensation ( which went ahead regardless in Cartagena) only to see Cartagena bars authorised to open this weekend, whilst theirs have to remain closed!

One minor victory was won last night;  Bars on all of La Manga del Mar Menor authorised to open from Saturday. Residents of La Manga del Mar Menor are once again unified, following the decision of the regional government to permit hostelries located in the San Javier run section of La Manga del Mar Menor (which lie at the far end of La Manga) to open their premises on Saturday at the same time as those which lie at the top section of “the strip” and are located inside the Cartagena municipality. Residents of the San Javier section are now authorised to move freely in Cartagena and travel up the strip instead of being marooned.

So from Monday, there may be further authorisations, but the re-opening of bars is certainly a carrot for other municipalities to apply as they try to bring down their cases. But not everybody is happy and the medical profession in the region has expressed its opposition, saying that the re-opening of bars is too early, should be applied for longer and will lead to cases rising again. They have reminded the regional government that case numbers in most municipalities are still 10 times higher than target levels, and even municipalities that have been permitted to open, such as Cartagena, had an AI rate four times the minimum recommended level on Friday, which they say is still too high to be relaxing the restrictions.

Other restrictions are still being applied all over Spain, with almost every region maintaining closed borders (except Galicia, Madrid and Extremadura) and multiple restrictions at local level, a situation which is changing rapidly every day, and makes travel very difficult.

Even at municipal level restrictions go on and off, for example, Lorca this week has banned visits to the Rafael Mendéz hospital due to an outbreak, but from Saturday the Region of Murcia is now starting to allow visits in the care homes of the region as an intensive regime of testing is helping to reduce the numbers of infections.

Vaccines

The key to returning to normal life is being viewed as the implementation of vaccines and this week there have been many articles about the situation.

The most important came last thing on Friday when Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said that his government aims to vaccinate the majority of the population by the middle of 2021. Spain will be allocated up to 140 million doses of the different vaccines as part of the EU group purchase agreement and has been formulating a vaccination strategy since September to roll-out the vaccines once they become available.

The PM said that the EU has already signed three contracts for the purchase of vaccines that are about to end their trials for 1,000 million doses and the signing of another two contracts to purchase 400 million more doses is "imminent". In total, the EU will be purchasing 1,400 million doses, of which 10% will be allocated to Spain, that is, 140 million.

This quantity is sufficient to vaccinate the entire Spanish population, with 20 million doses spare, given that the Covid vaccine is supplied in two doses. Logically, not all of the vaccines will be available at the same time and some may not even pass their trials, so the EU has effectively “hedged its bets” by pre-ordering a series of different vaccines.

The Council of Ministers is meeting next week to discuss the plans for roll-out. Immediately afterwards, there were warnings that Spain is logistically not ready at the moment to handle such a massive roll-out and the Health Minister said that his plans were for the vaccinations to start in January, which gives plenty of time to prepare. He was a little more conservative in his estimate, saying that he expects the "majority of the population" to be vaccinated by May or June, and also reiterated that Spain already has 13,000 vaccination points around the country and on previous occasions has successfully vaccinated more than 14 million people against flu in a 9 week period; so he is totally confident that logistically a mass vaccination will be possible.

One other point which is very important is that of whether the public will be obliged to accept the vaccine or not. Earlier this week there was a great deal of discussion about whether the vaccine would be compulsory or not and the Galician government announced that the vaccination would be compulsory in its region, and anyone refusing the vaccine would be fined 3,000 euros.

This is a point that obviously still requires full discussion between the autonomous regions, but on Saturday morning the national health minister said in an interview that vaccination would NOT be compulsory, "the experts say that this should not be compulsory as this could be counter-productive," he said.

Of course, this all depends on the vaccines being ready for use:

EU places order for up to 400 million Covid vaccines from German company CureVac; Five such deals have already been reached and talks with Moderna are on-going. Click to read

Janssen Covid vaccine begins phase III of its trials in Spain.The Spanish Agency for Medicines and Health Products (AEMPS) has authorized the first phase III clinical trial for the Janssen vaccine against Covid-19, manufactured by the company Janssen, belonging to the multinational Johnson & Johnson.In phase III the trial will be extended to a total of nine hospitals throughout Spain.The vaccine will be tested on a total of 30,000 volunteers from nine countries, including Belgium, Colombia, France, Germany, the Philippines, South Africa, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States. Click for article

 Moderna announces that its covid vaccine is 94.5% effective; click to read

The topic of antigen testing by pharmacies has been a busy topic for the last couple of weeks and the Ministry of Health has now relented and announced on Wednesday that dispensing chemists and pharmacies may be able to administer rapid antigen coronavirus tests in the near future, despite various concerns expressed by medical professionals over such procedures being taken out of the hands of fully qualified medics.Click for full article

In announcing the apparent change of heart Salvador Illa, the Minister for Health, explained that in those Autonomous Communities of Spain where the regional government wishes to empower pharmacies to perform testing it will be necessary to produce a detailed plan of action to ensure that proper procedures are followed. These include guarantees that the individuals performing the tests are adequately qualified and that the establishments where the service is offered will create separate “Covid” and “non-Covid” circuits for attending to members of the public. In Murcia, it's already been announced that the antigen testing by pharmacies will begin with testing on functionaries (employees of the regional government and local councils).

WHO advises against the use of Remdesivir in treating coronavirus.However, the same organization continues to offer support to further clinical testing with the same drug while also recommending the use of dexamethasone, a corticosteroid medication which is used in the treatment of many complaints including rheumatic complaints and which is widely available on the international market, in treating serious cases of Covid-19. This drug has provided some of the most encouraging results so far obtained, although it has not received the same high-profile publicity as Remdesivir during the first wave of the pandemic. Click to read

Barcelona trams equipped with PPE: Facemasks on trams remind commuters that public transport is safe. Click for article In an effort to reinforce the message that face masks must be worn and that public transport can be used safely, the trams of Barcelona are being redecorated with their own vinyl masks in the shade of light blue which has become such a familiar sight all over Spain over the last few months.

Spain needs more intensive care nurses to cope with the coronavirus pandemic.A study by the General Council of Nursing (CGE) entitled 'Analysis of the situation in the Covid-19 Intensive Care Units' published on Tuesday, concludes that intensive care units (ICU) in Spain would need 4,000 Nursing professionals in the most optimistic scenario of the pandemic and 13,400 in the most pessimistic to face a continued coronavirus health crisis. Click to read

Spanish government bans sale of face masks with exhalation valves.Since this spring the issue of facemasks being worn by members of the public has become one of the utmost importance in this country, as it has elsewhere in the world, and in order to ensure that only those of acceptable quality and characteristics are in use the Spanish government has announced that it intends to ban the sale of masks equipped with an exhalation valve.

The aim of the legislation which is being prepared is to prevent respiratory droplets from escaping from the mask and potentially spreading the Covid-19 virus, this being an acknowledged disadvantage of the “exhalation” or “non-return” valves fitted on some masks. A side-effect of these valves, according to the government, is that particles can escape when the wearer breathes, speaks, coughs or sneezes. Click for full article

Economy:

National food bank appeal in supermarkets this week.Every day, 1.8 million people receive help from one of the 54 food banks in Spain, most of them using the network of 8,053 charities that work through the foodbank system to make sure that those in need don´t go without food due to their economic situation.This figure represents an increase of 40% compared to before the outbreak of the coronavirus, as the crisis caused by Covid has increased the number of families at risk of poverty. This situation is not going to change in the short-term, indeed, the current spate of lockdowns and restrictions is already starting to impact on employment levels as more and more families face the prospect of their main breadwinner being made redundant for either a period of weeks or permanently.

This year the eighth edition of the “Gran Recogida”, the annual campaign to boost the stocks in food banks by asking members of the public to donate non-perishable foodstuffs, has been forced to itself adapt to the security and safety regulations imposed by the pandemic.

Normally volunteers man trollies in supermarkets to collect donations, but this year the number of volunteers is being cut back and restricted as the emphasis changes to collecting money instead of food products.It is also possible to donate online via the website www.granrecogidadealimentos.org which will be operational until December 6th (just click the red button Donar).

Merger talks between BBVA and Banco Sabadell - two of largest banks in Spain.

The state of turmoil into which the Spanish banking sector has been thrown by the coronavirus pandemic continues to show few signs of abating, and as speculation continues to surround numerous possible re-structuring operations the latest potential merger under consideration involves the BBVA and the Banco Sabadell.

Both have contracted investment analysts to evaluate a possible merger which, if it were to go ahead, would mean a coming together of the second and fifth largest banks in Spain. The upshot would be a single company managing almost 600,000 million euros’ worth of assets in this country, plus millions more abroad. Click to read

 No cruise ships on the horizon for Cartagena:The whole tourism sector has been absolutely flattened by coronavirus and here in the Region of Murcia, the port city of Cartagena has been very quiet without the normal bustle of thousands of foreign tourists pouring into the centre of the city when cruise ships dock. Millions of euros have been spent over the years investing into building a cruise ship tourism industry in the port in order to create work and long-term business opportunities, but all this ground to a halt last year when the Spanish Government decided to prohibit cruise ships from docking in Spanish ports due to the growing spread of coronavirus.Local businesses have certainly noticed the lack of money flowing into their tills, to say nothing of the loss of work for tour guides and those working in museums and tourist attractions.

At the moment, there are no cruise ships visiting the port for the remainder of the year and the Ministry of Development and Foreign Health has not authorized the docking of any cruise ships in Cartagena for next year.The only ports in Spain currently permitted to dock cruise ships are those in the Canary Islands, and last week German operator TUI operated its first cruise around the islands since the covid pandemic forced cruise ships to stop sailing.However, the ban is not set to be lifted any time soon and in the meantime the border closures nationally mean that tourism is dead in the water for the remainder of this winter season, even the ski resorts in Spain facing  a bleak Christmas.

Murcia Covid:

The number of new coronavirus cases has continued to fall all week in the Murcia Region as the effects of the restrictions imposed on the hostelry sector two weeks ago and other measures implemented continue to impact on the daily infections rate.

The number of new cases on Friday in the region was the lowest for over two months, and the percentage of PCR tests returning a positive result has fallen to a third of the levels delivered last week.

On Friday 16th October the Murcia Region had 27,381 cases. On Friday 23rd October the reported figure was 31,378, on Friday 30th this figure had risen to 36,601, by Friday  6th November the total had reached 42,088 and last Friday the total climbed to 47,948.

This week the figure has reached 50,862, which is an increase of only 2,914 new cases, compared to 5.487 last week, so a significant reduction in the number of new cases.

PCR tests: Although the number of PCR tests taken this week have been lower than last week, the most important information to come out of this is that the percentage of positives had fallen to 5.6% by Friday. Last week the rate was averaging around 15%, which means that three times the number of cases would have been diagnosed from the same number of tests as have been detected this week. This shows that the percentage of the population who are positive is falling, good news, as it decreases the chance of casually contracting covid through contact.

AI rate
This brings the average number of cases over 100,00 over the last 7 days down to 199.3 across the whole of the region and 579 across the last 14 day period, a big fall from the 374 of last Friday for 7 days and the 781 for 14 days (if the first figure is less than half of the second, the the rate of infections is falling...).

Number of new cases in the last 7 and 14 days by municipality:
Note, the first figure shown is the actual number of cases diagnosed in the last 7 days, the second is the total in the last 14 days:
Abanilla 12/40( This means 12 cases in the last 7 days and 40 cases in 14 days)
Abarán 8/25
Águilas 34/57
Albudeite 3/13
Alcantarilla 89/306
Aledo 4/12
Los Alcázares 47/121
Alguazas 14/45
Alhama de Murcia 71/235
Archena 51/136
Beniel 9/40
Blanca 9/53
Bullas 9/40
Calasparra 21/48
Campos del Río 2/13
Caravaca de la Cruz 111/410
Cartagena 224/568
Cehegín 55/176
Ceutí 18/72
Cieza 63/172
Fortuna 4/57
Fuente Álamo 39/135
Jumilla 102/250
Librilla 7/33
Lorca 226/460
Lorquí 4/16
Mazarrón 34/122
Molina de Segura 85/239
Moratalla 6/68
Mula 32/86
Murcia 788/2582
Ojós 0
Pliego 6/10
Puerto Lumbreras 22/83
Ricote 3/4
San Javier 88/208
San Pedro del Pinatar 35/116
Santomera 19/42
Torre Pacheco 117/266
Las Torres de Cotillas 16/92
Totana 148/358
Ulea 0
La Unión 42/99
Villanueva del Río Segura 4/16
Yecla 233/549
Those from other regions diagnosed in Murcia 62
Total 2977 . Acumulated AI rate in the last 7 days: 199. IA rate for the last 14 days 579.
These figures have all fallen significantly this week, which will have a knock-on effect on the number of hospitalisations moving forward, providing there is no resurgence in new cases.

(shows the order in which the municipalities of Murcia are listed by IA rate)

Hospitalisations:

The number of patients hospitalised has been slowly decreasing this week;  last Friday there were 626 covid patients in hospital; this Friday the figure has fallen to 534. However, the number in intensive care has risen from 104 last Friday to 109. These are still very high figures and hospitals remain under significant pressure, but the situation has eased slightly from last week.

Fatalities:

Last week there were 85 deaths and this week there have been 73, taking the overall total to 533.

So as these figures clearly show, the number of new cases in the Murcia region has dropped down considerably this week, as the restrictions take effect, although hospitals remain under significant pressure. Hopefully the re-opening of the hostelry sector won´t create a resurgence in new cases, although it will take some time for the number of active cases in the system, 10,418, to work their way through, hopefully culminating in recoveries rather than fatalities, although it is expected that the fatalities will continue to be high for at least two more weeks.

Two clinics in Cartagena and Torre Pacheco closed for carrying out fraudulent PCR tests.The Ministry of Health of the Region of Murcia has closed two clinics, located in the municipalities of Cartagena (Pozo Estrecho) and Torre Pacheco, after an internal investigation discovered that “PCR tests” were being carried out without the appropriate licensing required for such an activity and were in fact not PCR tests at all.The Ministry confirmed that both centres had been closed as a “precautionary measure” pending a full investigation into the activities of the two clinics. Click for full article

Other Murcia news:

Dog rescue organisations relieved as Eurotunnel does rapid U-turn. A petition rapidly saw-off a change in the rules by Eurotunnel which amended its travel conditions to state that only 5 dogs could travel through with each passenger, which would cause a significant problem for dog rescue organisations that transport dogs to the UK for re-homing in specially adapted dog transporters to keep costs down. Within hours, Eurotunnel backed down and issued a statement apologising to charities and re-assuring them that properly licensed charity transporters would be permitted to continue using the service as normal, although the rules had changed for everyone else.

Spanish Prime Minister sends personal letter to young man who suffered homophobic attack in Cartagena.The President of the Spanish Government, Pedro Sánchez, has sent a letter of support to an 11-year-old student who denounced an alleged homophobic attack in the vicinity of the Isaac Peral Institute in Cartagena to remind him that "you are not alone."The Prime Minister sent a personalised letter to the victim saying,“you have on your side the Government of Spain, Murcia, Cartagena, your institute, your friends, your family and the vast majority of society, who are proud to be diverse. Count on all of us to grow in freedom and without fear, to be as you want to be without anyone preventing you from fulfilling your dreams. I want to assure you that hatred has no future in our country.”

Oil rig mega platform arrives at Escombreras in Cartagena for repair.This week an alternative revenue stream for local contractors arrived in the Escombreras docks in Cartagena in the form of the oil rig 'Scarabeo 9', owned by the multinational Saipem, which will undergo repair and modernization works during the next six months.The Scarabeo 9 is a sixth generation, self-propelled semi-submersible oil rig, a large structure 115 meters long, 78 meters wide and 23 meters deep, capable of submerging up to 3,600 meters deep which entered service eight years ago.

Until a week ago the rig was docked in the port of Las Palmas, but due to the expiry of the port zone occupation concession, another location had to be found, and Cartagena was selected for the job.The Canary Islands formerly held the monopoly of these jobs in Spain, but repair and maintenance jobs are now being placed in other areas and Cartagena has won work from five platforms of these characteristics since 2018 each giving several months of work for local contractors.

  Another cashpoint machine ripped out of the wall by thieves in Murcia.Last year police dismantled a gang of Albanians, Serbs and one Spaniard who had undertaken 9 similar robberies, also using a towtruck. They were finally caught after stealing a cashpoint machine in Archivel. Click for this article

Mar Menor:

Work begins on new stormwater tank in Torre Pacheco.

Various projects to protect the marine environment of the Mar Menor and to reduce the risk of flooding in towns along its shore and in the Campo de Cartagena appear to be becoming bogged down in the planning stage at the moment, but one on which construction has started is the creation of a new stormwater tank in the municipality of Torre Pacheco.

3 million euros are being invested by the regional government of Murcia in a 6,000-cubic-metre environmental tank and a water collection pool holding up to 60,000 cubic metres, the equivalent of 24 Olympic-sized swimming pools. These infrastructures are intended to prevent water which overflows from the sewage network in times of heavy rain from making its way into the Mar Menor. Click for full article

Permission to use the land on which the tank is being built was applied for as long ago as April 2019,  but was not received until last month, a delay which underlines the need for local, regional and national governments to work together in order to make progress as rapidly and as efficiently as possible.

Efficiency is something of which there is a frustrating lack in the whole sorry saga of the Mar Menor, as departments from different bodies of regional and national governments and the CHS fail to work together for the common good, a situation which is amply illustrated by the time it has taken the CHS to obtain permission to repair a pipe in the El Albujón pumping station:

More than three weeks of agricultural water pouring into the Mar Menor before permission could be secured to repair a broken pipe:It’s been reported this week that the Ministry of Agriculture has finally granted a works permit to the Segura Hydrographic Confederation (CHS) to repair a broken pipeline in the El Albujón water pumping system, which has been discharging tens of thousands of litres of agricultural water run-off into the Mar menor for the last three weeks.

The pipeline had broken in Los Narejos, within a protected area of the Red Natura, so the CHS needed an express permit from the Autonomous Community, a process which has taken three weeks to complete. Since October 28th, 300 litres of agricultural run-off per second has been pouring into the lagoon through the Albujón rambla. The pumping station is designed to divert 5 cubic hectometres of agricultural water run-off per year from the lagoon, helping to prevent further environmental disaster.
The regional Ministry for the environment has proposed that the CHS request a one year repairs permit as the pumping station frequently breaks down, or breaks occur in the pipework; a one year permit would avoid the CHS having to request permission each time there is an incident and speed up repairs.
As a general rule, it takes about ten days to grant the environmental permit.

Unfortunately, delays have continued to frustrate efforts to resolve the issues faced by the Mar Menor: Planned de-nitrification plant in San Pedro del Pinatar stalled:Progress continues to be agonizingly slow towards reducing the runoff of harmful substances from the crop fields of the Campo de Cartagena into the Mar Menor, the eventual aim being to achieve “zero runoff”, the latest news being that one of the key infrastructures of the project, the de-nitrification plant which is to be built alongside the salt flats of San Pedro del Pinatar, must await further modifications and approval procedures before the planning stage can be completed.

The draft plans for the plant, with a budgeted construction cost of 12.2 million euros, have been completed by the ministry of Agriculture in the regional government of Murcia and submitted to the CHS water infrastructures management body, but further progress is now “on hold” as the national Ministry of Ecological Transition considers its modifications. Click to read the full article

Other Spanish news

Express deportations at Spanish borders backed by the Constitutional Court.There was widespread indignation in Spain in 2015 when the PP government introduced a new Citizen Security Protection Law which many felt denied people the right to make public protests, but more than 5 years after the so-called “gagging law” (or Ley Mordaza) came into force the Constitutional Court has ruled that it is almost entirely within the limits established by the Constitution and is therefore valid.

The law brought in far stiffer fines for offences such as preventing an eviction, climbing a monument, camping in the Paseo de la Castellana in Madrid or disturbing the peace in the vicinity of the Congress building, ranging from 100 euros to 600,000 euros, and the legislation met with widespread opposition from the moment it was first presented by the government in November 2013. Modifications were introduced but only members of the PP voted in favour of it in parliament, and opposition parties at the time announced that it would be repealed if the PP lost their majority at the general election later that year.

However, this did not happen when the PSOE eventually formed a government in 2018, and only now has the law been pronounced upon by the Constitutional Court. Their ruling is that the only unconstitutional element is the “unauthorized” taping of phone conversations by the police, which goes against the basic rights of citizens.

This means that one of the measures included in the Law which has caused most heated debate over the last five years, the legalization of the process by which illegal immigrants can be returned to their country of origin directly rather than by observing all the “correct” administrative procedures, is upheld and can continue to be implemented in the north African Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla. Basing their decision on the doctrine of the European Court of Human Rights, the magistrates of the Constitutional Court explain that returning migrants directly to Morocco is a way of “re-establishing legality immediately”, the only caveat being that all such actions should be carried out with judicial approval rather than merely on the recommendation of the Ministry of the Interior.This immediate return consists of a process of returning migrants through a back door when they climb over the border fences, a process which has attracted significant criticism over the years.

The migrant crisis has been very much in the news due to the situation in the Canary Islands this week.

Migrant crisis in the Canary Islands as detention facilities spill over:Over 200 irregular migrants were released from overcrowded Red Cross facilities into the streets with nowhere to go

This year has seen a spectacular increase in the number of irregular migrants attempting to reach EU territory via the Canary Islands by making perilous Atlantic voyages from western Africa, and the migratory crisis has reached boiling point in the islands this week as the latest wave of small boats arriving has led to there simply not being enough room to hold the migrants.

By the end of October at least 400 migrants were known to have died while attempting to sail to the Canaries, but this week attention in the Spanish media has shifted to the problems caused by the numbers of people making the crossing successfully. By 15th November the number of unauthorized arrivals in the islands this year had reached 16,760, eleven times more than in the equivalent period last year and considerably higher than the total for the other Mediterranean coastlines of Spain.

During the first fortnight of this month migrants had been arriving at an average rate of 356 per day, and the total for the month between 15th October and 15th November was more than for the whole of the first nine and a half months of the year. As a result of this influx of unauthorized migrants, and with the figures rising still higher over the weekend, it appears that the overstretched detention centres facilities reached breaking point at the Red Cross temporary detention facility on the quay of Arguineguín in Gran Canaria, which was designed to hold just over 400 people.

In recent weeks Arguineguín has been acting as a temporary home to over 2,000 irregular economic migrants, many of them young men looking for work, crammed into a tiny area with basic food, inadequate sanitation and barely enough room to stretch their legs. Local residents were aware of the seriousness of the situation as the number of people on the quay exceeded the official population, but it did not become clear to the rest of Spain until the police, in what has now been described as an “error” by the Ministry of the Interior, released 227 migrants without alternative accommodation having been provided. The officers concerned reasoned that the permitted 72 hours for detaining people without a charge being issued had elapsed and that the crowded conditions constituted a health hazard. Click here to read the full article. This caused an outcry nationwide and prompted a flurry of action at ministerial level; by Saturday the number of migrants in the docks had been reduced as the migrants were moved to alternative accommodation and diplomatic processes initiated to resume the extraditions process to return most of what are, essentially economic migrants, to their country of origin.The number of small boats reaching Spain has declined this week, although there have been some arrivals. In Murcia 9 migrants reached the coast, and plans have been announced this week to move the new arrivals from their temporary camp in the container port to a more practical space in the Escombreras docks.

Controversial education law criticized for undermining the Spanish language in regions with their own language.The Ley Celáa, the eighth such law in 40 years divides opinion in many sectors of Spanish society

A new law governing the Spanish education system was narrowly passed in parliament on Thursday after a heated debate, with opinions so clearly divided that it is considered likely that it will be replaced as soon as there is a change in government.The new law, the eighth of its kind in Spain since the restoration of democracy in the late 1970s, is widely referred to as the “Ley Celáa” after the current Minister of Education, Isabel Celáa, and replaces the equally controversial “Ley Wert” which was brought in seven years ago. Among the aspects which have met with most opposition is the decision to eliminate the description of Castilian Spanish as the “vehicular language” or “working language” of schools and education in the regions of the country where there is more than one official language.

This is the case, for example, in Galicia, the Basque Country, the Balearics, the Comunidad Valenciana and Catalunya, and many fear that the modification represents a concession to separatists which could lead to children in some areas failing to achieve communicative competence in the language which most of the rest of the world refers to simply as “Spanish”. Click to read full article

Concern along the Mediterranean costas as Xylella fastidiosa spreads in the Costa Blanca.

Alarm bells are ringing again in the agriculture sector along the Mediterranean coastlines of Spain, particularly among olive and almond growers, following the detection of more cases of Xylella fastidiosa, a bacterium sometimes referred to as “almond ebola” due to its devastating effect on both kinds of tree.

The latest detections are in the Valencia Region, specifically in the Elche municipality of the Alicante province, but the bacterium is spreading slowly down along the coast, threatening the future of crops in areas such as the Murcia Region, where olives and almonds are routinely cultivated but also in the spiritual homeland of Spanish olive oil production; Andalucía, where vast olive plantations spread across large swathes of the countryside.Click to read

Many apologies for the late delivery on Saturday; I was writing in the back-end of the programme, pressed save to go and make a coffee and the internet had gone off, wiping out 2 hours of work, so had to start again.Apologies.

Have a good week and stay positive; there are certainly green shoots of optimism to be seen.