Europe

Home page

Europe

'Stay home,' Madrid authorities tell residents as coronavirus cases jump

14 March 2020 23:11 (UTC +04:00)

Authorities in Madrid urged people to stay home, the southern city of Seville announced the cancellation of hugely popular Holy Week celebrations and shops in several regions shut down on Saturday as Spain scrambled to try and fight the coronavirus, APA reports citing Reuters.

pain is the second-hardest hit country in Europe after Italy, with 5,753 cases recorded on Saturday, up by a third from Friday even as health authorities in Madrid, which has the highest number of cases, stopped testing people with only mild symptoms.

Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s leftwing government took few steps at first to impose tough measures and changed tack only this week as numbers soared. The opposition has criticized the government for letting events like International Women’s Day marches go ahead a week ago.

“In the past few weeks, serious negligence has been committed by the government, such as encouraging a massive demonstration with hundreds of thousands of people last Sunday,” Pablo Casado, the leader of the conservative opposition People’s Party said on Friday.

National and regional authorities have said they reacted appropriately, taking stronger measures when the number of cases started soaring on Monday.

With schools now shut across the country and a first package of economic measures announced on Thursday, the government met - via videoconference - on Saturday to prepare a new package of economic and social measures.

It was expected to spell out later in the day what a 15-day state of emergency announced on Friday will mean in practice.

In an increasingly deserted capital city, where all shops except supermarkets and pharmacies shut down, posters put up by the city authorities read: “The best option to prevent the propagation of the virus is to stay at home.”

On public radio, official messages told people to wash their hands, use disposable tissues and avoid all but essential travel.

Madrid Mayor Jose Luis Martinez-Almeida said in an interview with El Pais newspaper that a lockdown of Madrid was “closer than we think”.

It could include restrictions on public and private transport, he said, but this would depend on the evolution of the virus.

“This all looks terrible and terrifying, everything is super empty, we found a supermarket opened but nothing else,” said Jessica, visiting from Spain’s Canary Islands and asking to be identified only by her first name.