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The interview has only just begun when Isabel Díaz Ayuso, president of the Community of Madrid, pronounces a few words this Wednesday morning that all of Spain will read a few minutes later. “People are just getting infected, children are just getting infected, everyone is getting infected, and school hasn’t started yet.”
Ayuso promises that classrooms are safe. But there the words are already in the world, and it is no longer about school. The sentences are seen as an admission, because the virus has long been rampant in Madrid again without control. From this week, at the latest, the Spaniards wonder if they will relive the scenes that so shocked the country in March.
The number of infected people has increased for weeks.
Nervousness is also growing in France and Italy. The Mediterranean states were the first and most affected by the virus, and they fought it with the strictest measures. Now fear returns to southern Europe. The number of infected people has been increasing for weeks and in some cases they have already reached the peak values of spring.
It is true that the greatest danger this time does not come from Italy, but mainly from Spain. But there is great concern that massive outbreaks of Covid-19, such as those in Madrid or Paris, will also be repeated with some delay in Italy and may soon threaten the whole of Europe.
Why are the numbers increasing again in the south? What is different this time from spring? And how are the governments of Madrid, Paris and Rome reacting to the new situation? Crisis managers across Europe are looking closely to the Mediterranean to prepare for the upcoming Corona fall.
All Paris wears blue, blue surgical masks
Perhaps there are two truths. One truth is that the Paris metropolitan area has once again been a risk zone since August 24, because the contagion rate here exceeds 50 per thousand inhabitants. For a week now, all of Paris wears blue, blue surgical masks, because now it is mandatory to wear masks throughout the city area, even outside, and not only on public transport and in shops as before. Many French people have the impression that the summer was only a short break from the threatening infection process and that now things are starting again.
Several southern cities have also opted for a mask requirement. In Marseille there is even a ban on alcohol from 11pm, restaurants and bars have to close so that no one will forget the distance rules when drunk. The port city, as well as the entire large Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region were classified as a risk zone as Paris.
But one can also look a little more soberly at the increase in the number of infections, which can be explained on the one hand by the large number of people returning from vacation and on the other by the much greater number of tests carried out. There are currently around 900,000 each week, much more than in March or April, when tests were mainly reserved for the sick. In mid-March, only 5,000 people were being tested a day in France. That belongs to the other truth.
Like the fact that despite all the warnings, some vacation spots were able to turn into super spreader zones, because especially the younger vacationers under 40 wanted to celebrate again despite the pandemic. In Saint Tropez, for example, the discos were closed, but at some point the tables were gathered in the restaurants and danced to the music of specially hired DJs. That was not without consequences.
The percentage of those who tested positive has tripled in recent weeks and is now 4.3 percent; In the 24 hours from Thursday to Friday of this week there were 7,157 cases. However, 80 percent of them had no or hardly any symptoms. 21 infected people died in these 24 hours. For comparison: on April 15, France recorded 1,500 deaths in one day.
Nowhere does the virus spread as fast as in Spain
Nowhere in Europe is the virus spreading as rapidly as in Spain. There are now more than 200 corona cases per 100,000 residents. The curve is similar to March, but many young people are now affected and infections are now better recognized. A large proportion of those affected have no symptoms.
The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, blames family celebrations and parties for the increase. The reasons are clear, he says: “mobility, nightlife. People have become more neglected.”
However, it was his government that was determined to open the country before the Christmas season so as not to alienate tourists. Regions like Madrid had not hired enough people to trace the chains of infection. In Germany, for example, there is now a travel warning again for all of Spain, the season was bad anyway, and now it’s over. Economically, this is a catastrophe for Spain.
Hasty opening alone cannot explain the many cases. For this reason, cultural factors are increasingly being discussed in Spain. Spanish cities are especially densely built in the center, families often live in small apartments. In the evenings they meet friends at the bar, they sit together, often for hours. All this makes Spain so livable, now proximity is becoming a problem.
As in spring, Madrid becomes the center of the pandemic. About a third of corona cases were last recorded there, and more recently there were 467 infections per 100,000 residents. Even the many tests cannot explain these numbers; 13 to 14 percent of smears are now positive. The virus is particularly rampant in the working-class neighborhoods of the southeast of the city.
In Madrid, the regional government is taking tougher measures. Meetings with friends and family should be limited to ten people. If the virus continues to spread uncontrollably in Madrid, experts fear an effect similar to that of spring. The virus could spread in a star shape from the capital to more remote areas of the country.
Example Italy: “The running of the bulls worked”
Can developments like those in France and Spain still be stopped? Can a second wave like the spring wave be prevented? When Italy’s Health Minister Roberto Speranza appeared before Parliament on Wednesday, he was relieved to see him. “The blockade in our country worked,” said the 41-year-old department head, the behavior of Italians and government measures had managed to lower the infection curve.
The government of Rome currently has 23 positives per 100,000 inhabitants. In France this rate is 88 and in Spain 205 infected. Italy has a “considerable advantage over the vast majority of European countries,” Speranza said.
However, the situation is not so optimistic in his home country either. The number of positive test results between South Tyrol and Sardinia has been increasing continuously for weeks, most recently by more than 1,300 infected people per day. That is significantly less than in Spain or France, but nervousness is growing. Norway, the first European country, has just issued another travel advisory for Italy.
Virologists attribute Italy’s relative success to the particularly tight and particularly long blockade of the country. In early March, Rome was the first European government to impose curfews across the country, which only gradually relaxed in May, more slowly and with more cautious steps than in other EU countries.
Whats Next
The governments of Madrid, Paris and Rome, like other EU countries, are confident of recognizing regional outbreaks as soon as possible and isolating breeding centers. Sufficient testing capacities are available and the need for hospital beds and especially intensive care settings is accurately recorded, say Italian crisis managers, for example.
The situation in hospitals is still relatively relaxed. But what if the average age of those infected (in Italy it is only 29 years old) increased again? When do emergency rooms get another attack?
The governments of Italy, Spain and France absolutely want to avoid a new national blockade. It would have disastrous consequences for the economy. And it would also make the differences in the euro zone even more apparent.
But in France at least, as Prime Minister Jean Castex recently said, contingency plans for another national shutdown are already in the drawers of ministries.
