New Covid-19 restrictions to be announced on Monday or Tuesday

Catalonia will be implementing further Covid-19 restrictions in the coming days as the spread of the Delta variant has caused infections to skyrocket.

The measures, which will be announced on Monday or Tuesday, are necessary given the "explosion" in cases, says president Pere Aragonès.

Speaking from Hospitalet de Llobregat, near Barcelona, where he and health minister Josep Maria Argimon met with Bellvitge hospital medical professionals, the Catalan president warned that society is "going through difficult times."

According to Aragonès, however, these soon-to-be-announced measures will take into account "social, financial, and emotional" needs. 

Covid-19 cases soaring

This past week there has been a significant surge in Covid-19 cases, largely due to the spread of the Delta variant among younger age groups, with record-high daily infections.

As of July 10, 2021, there have been a total of 778,065 confirmed Covid-19 cases and 22,283 people have died. Although the outbreak risk decreased somewhat on Saturday, 88 more people required hospitalization than the day prior. 

4,559,164 residents have been given the first dose of the vaccine, 58% of the total population. Out of those, 3,269,608 have also been administered a second dose (41.7% of the total population). 3,636,334 residents are considered to be fully immunized (46.3%).