When the official state of alarm in Spain ended on Saturday, revellers were quick to get out on the streets to celebrate. After six months of confinement, they were determined to party like Christmas, New Year and their birthdays had all come together.
The problem is that, whilst the number of cases of coronavirus here have dropped over the last week, the average is still very high particularly in Madrid, Catalonia, Navarre, Aragón and the Basque Country
Pictures in El Pais from the Puerta del Sol, Madrid show that it was packed in spite of the case rate of 198 per 100,000 for the city. Several squares in Barcelona were apparently also crowded with revellers as they were in Palma de Mallorca.
Perhaps these people should take note of what has happened in India. The case rate there had dropped to what the government thought were safe levels; restrictions were lifted, people flocked to election rallies, religious festivals and large weddings. The consequences have been awful; a rapid rise in cases, lack of hospital beds, limited oxygen supplies and even scenes of cremations out in the street.
If Spain had managed to vaccinate the large numbers that countries like the UK has, then it might just have been safe to gradually ease restrictions. To abandon them altogether, as happened on Saturday, must surely risk a further rise in cases especially when you consider that the majority of the revellers out on streets were probably from age groups that have not yet been vaccinated.
Boris Johnson has been criticised by some for being too slow to lift restrictions in England. Whilst I am no fan of his, I think on this occasion, he is right to be cautious. As Jim Ryder, who recently moved back to Liverpool will testify, I was taught to be cautious.
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