Health are considering moving Tenerife and Gran Canaria to Level 3
A few weeks ago the Canary Islands had the best incidence rates over 14 days in the whole of Spain, but since then the archipelago has taken a backward step as many people seem to think the pandemic is over, and now occupies ninth place in the rankings, behind Extremadura (42 cases), Balearic Islands (54), Valencia (63), La Rioja (72), Murcia (74), Castilla y La Mancha (80), Galicia (90) and Cantabria (100).
At the moment it is a daily ‘battle’ between the two capital islands, Tenerife and Gran Canaria, as to which one has the most new cases. On Monday it was Gran Canaria who had 92 new positives against the 48 in Tenerife, in the last 24 hours Gran Canaria registered 89 new cases, and Tenerife 102, the first time in two months the island had more than 100 cases in one day.
Today the central Government via the Ministry of Health led by Carolina Darias will announce restrictions for a two week period from March 26th over Easter, and tomorrow the regional Governing Council will review the latest reports and epidemiological data of the Canary Islands, and it is very likely that it will raise the alert levels in Tenerife and Gran Canaria to Level 3, given the rebound in cases, and reluctance of data to decrease, in both islands.
The latest data for these two islands is worrying. People’s ignorance to the situation is costing us all. It’s costing some people’s lives. It’s costing businesses. It’s costing us all as we move backwards into a stricter alert level, and it will cost us even further when other countries open and the islands cannot have tourists.
We all have to ask ourselves as individuals, business owners, workers, clients, are we doing all we can to prevent the spread of the virus? Are tables spaced correctly? Are people wearing masks? Are we following regulations as far as we could? If the answer to any of these is no, do something about it, our future depends on it. All of our futures.
In Tenerife’s case, you have to go back to January 7th for the last time there was over 100 new cases in one day, when 143 were detected, and two days before it reported 110, far from the 183, for example on December 29th. The restrictive measures began to improve the records and on February 1st, the Island even presented 21 infections, although it stabilized for several days in its thirties and entered alert Level 1.
However, a sustained rise in cases began due to increased non-compliance by the population, the last one being a party in a restaurant in El Centenero, Los Baldíos, La Laguna, with 117 participants, including children, when the maximum allowed is 6 people, except. The owner of the premises, who apparently did not have a license for this activity, and the organizer of the meeting are both facing a penalty of between 3,000 and 60,000 euros. The sanction has been served awaiting a court date.