On Thursday, Spain's Minister of Health revealed in the Congress of Deputies that the Pedro Sánchez Government had confirmed on March 3 the community transmission of the coronavirus in Spain. This was closely followed by the 8M march which took place around five days later.
The ideological gathering which happened in Madrid had at least 120,000 people attending the event. Similar to the gathering in Madrid there were around 70 other gatherings in the community. The socialist José Manuel Franco who led the Government Delegation didn't suspend the gatherings.
During his appearance on the Health Committee of the Lower House, the Minister of Health stated that as of March 3 when the cases had reached 149, the country had confirmed the community transmissions as well but it was sporadic and not sustained. Prior to this, the European Union had requested its members to follow social distancing. The EU through the European Center for Disease Control and Prevention to avoid any mass gathering in the states in order to avoid a pandemic situation.
Avoidance of EU recommendations and self-criticisms
Spain has reportedly continued to say that the incident "took a turn during the last days of February." Without heeding to the warning placed by the EU, the country saw a drastic rise in the number of cases in the past few weeks.
Spain had continued the connectivity and flights with Italy and other regions till March 10. Recently the country has been criticized for the lack of foresight during the coronavirus pandemic which has affected several countries across the world. The address by the Sanchez government continues the same rhetoric as before. The Health Minister countered the criticism by saying that the government is investing around 509 million euros to buy more medical equipment.
Recently, the European nation had requested Chinese markets for equipment such as surgical and non-surgical masks, gloves, several rapid tests and assisted breathing equipment to reinforce ICUs. Soon after the acquisition of several such equipment Spain has complained about the invalid tests that Bioeasy a company from China had sent to Spain as a rapid test. Spain is also involved in joint operations with the EU.
The number of cases in Spain has slowed down compared to the past week. Despite the coronavirus fears earlier this month there was a large gathering in several parts of the world during the women's day march. Tens of thousands of people took to the streets to protest against gender violence, the gender wage gap, sexism and the burden of non-remunerated work in the country. The cases in Spain has reached around 64,059 with more than 4,000 deaths.
