Two employees of a funeral home remove the body of a Covid victim from a nursing home in Barcelona.Emilio Morenatti / AP
The second wave of the pandemic made its dramatic mark in November.
The Ministry of Health has notified about 9,200 deaths in Spain throughout this month, making it the one that has registered the most deaths since April.
The figure includes the deceased that Health has been reporting between October 30, the last day of that month in which it quantified the number of deaths, and this Monday, the last day of November: it is likely that, when the series of data in recent weeks, the figure is even higher.
The delays in notifications and the poor quality and updating of the data provided by the Ministry of Health continue to make analysis difficult.
But even comparing the series already closed and refined by the Ministry (where part of the deaths reported in November are assigned to the month of October and instead there are missing deaths from the last weeks, which will be notified in the coming days), the month of November It is still the deadliest since April, with more than 6,279 deaths confirmed by covid-19, a figure that will increase significantly in the final count.
In April there were 15,672 deaths and in March, 10,286, already with refined series.
The data available so far confirm that the second wave of the coronavirus is hitting communities unevenly.
Andalusia, Asturias, Murcia, Aragón, Ceuta and Melilla have had more deaths in the last month than in any of the other months of the pandemic - and this even taking into account that they are provisional data that will most likely end up being higher.
In the Principality, at least 54% of all deaths from covid in the community occurred in November, that is, more people have died in the last month than between March and October.
In Andalusia, at least 48%.
It is about autonomies that in the first wave did not register so many infections or deaths.
“It is logical that communities less affected in the first wave in this second are more so, because populations that were not exposed to the coronavirus then are affected now,” says epidemiologist Patricia Guillem, from the European University of Valencia.
“In several of these communities there has been a very rapid emergence.
It started with young people with the famous non-parties, ”says Guadalupe Fontán, a health management specialist from the General Nursing Council.
"They carried the virus to their families and now we see that it is reaching the elderly," adds the nurse.
Of the communities that have worsened, Asturias and Aragón have the worst death rate per 100,000 inhabitants in November (52 and 47 respectively), when the average for Spain is just under 14, just the same as Andalusia and a little below that of Murcia (16).
The best is the Canary Islands.
In total, the system collects 45,069 deaths.
This parameter is the only one that has not yet improved, despite the drop in cases that began the second week of November.
If the accumulated in seven days is taken, the figure (1,938) is even higher than that of November 2 (1,220).
The communities affected by this worsening assess this situation in different ways.
The director of the Asturian Health Service, Concepción Saavedra, admits that although the first wave was very mild in the community, in the second, “from the week of October 30”, there was an increase in cases “which was surprising because it was all very fast ”.
"Income increased 77% and the occupancy of ICU beds doubled."
"That is why on November 3 we already asked for confinement," he adds.
Saavedra believes that the biggest factor for this increase was that "due to the very good behavior during the first wave, only 2% of the population was immunized, according to seroprevalence studies," and many people were affected in the second.
"First it was those under 29 years of age, but when those over 65 began to be infected, we began to see hospitals and ICUs occupied."
Now it is starting to decline, but it will take time to notice because hospitalizations and admissions to ICUs are long.
Although we have tripled the intensive care beds [they have gone from 96 to 258] and there are another 200 beds prepared, ”he says, in case the situation after Christmas worsens.
"In Aragon we have had a period of excess mortality than expected a few weeks after each peak, and now we are in that period: from November 16 to 24, 697 more deaths than expected, an increase of 60%, over all in those under 65 years old, ”says a spokeswoman for the Ministry of Health.
“According to MOMO, today the trend line in Aragon continues above the historical average of mortality of the last 10 years, exceeding the upper limit of the confidence interval, which means that there is an excess of mortality over expected deaths.
Although in recent days we are in clear decline.
With respect to the first period of mortality, the fundamental difference is that in spring 83% of mortality occurred in residences, a percentage that has been reduced to less than half in the two following periods ”.
The Director General of Public Health of the Region of Murcia, José Carlos Vicente, admits that this second wave "has run with a greater intensity than the first", but has stressed that the figures are beginning to subside, and has called for continue to observe "all the protection rules", especially the use of a mask at all times, also in bars and terraces, and only take it off for food and drink, reports
Virginia Vadillo.
“The virus has had a tremendous impact on the region due to citizen behavior and the Board did not adopt the measures already demanded: reinforcing primary care, having at least one tracker for every 5,000 inhabitants, massive tests and housing alternatives in hotels for the positive ones with special circumstances ”, reasons José Martínez Olmos, professor at the Andalusian School of Public Health.
The expert emphasizes that November has been "a terrible month" in Granada and Seville, university and tourist cities, where the Pilar bridge triggered the incidence of the virus, reports
Javier Martín-Arroyo.
“There has been too much run and if we now open our hand with the restrictions, we run the risk of the third wave.
It would be enough to assume the traffic light of the Interterritorial, which had the Andalusian agreement and according to which we are generally on high alert ”, he recommends.
The cases follow their downward line.
Over the weekend, 19,979 were reported, a figure that was not that low in a weekend since the 19,382 on August 24.
There are already 1,648,187 registered cases.
With this drop, the incidence at 14 days continues to decline.
It is already below 300 (275.51).
This decrease should be noted "in six or eight weeks" in the deceased, who are the last in the sequence of infection, explains Fontán.
Hospital pressure clearly improves.
The bed occupancy rate for covid patients is 11.85%.
A month ago it was 15.51.
The occupancy of ICUs also drops somewhat, and is at 26.74% of coronavirus patients, practically the same as on October 30 (26.59%), after having exceeded 32%.
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