2672 new cases and 22 dead in two days // Authorities appeal for less socialising
Portuguese news in English on October 9, 2020.
By the numbers
There’s not really any way to sugarcoat the numbers from the past two days. In terms of cases they were the second and third worst ever recorded, with 2672 new infections confirmed in two days. Another 22 covid-19 patients died in the same period, which is unfortunately par for the course recently, and another 21 are in intensive care, following more than a week in which numbers remained stable. Hospitalisations kept rising more or less in line with what we’ve been seeing. Lisbon is still heavily affected but the north is suffering more, with 51% of the new confirmed cases from today and yesterday. As if to rub salt into the wound, even the relatively unaffected Azores and Madeira recorded a handful of new cases today. All of this comes as testing rates increase significantly, with 28,392 carried out on Wednesday, the most ever. Unfortunately this does not fully explain the higher number of cases, particularly as 8% of those tests returned positive results, a concerning figure even allowing for possible double ups. As Johns Hopkins points out, you really want to keep that number below 5%.
Active, recovered, deaths, contacts under surveillance, confirmed, hospitalised, in ICU.
Authorities appeal for less socialising
The Director-General of Health has made a direct appeal for people to cut back on socialising as the number of positive cases soars, Público reports. Graça Freitas on Friday revealed “family gatherings”, such as weddings and baptisms, were responsible for 67% of cases. Many of you may not have family here but the appeal can be applied to any sort of gathering that joins together a large number of people. Gatherings of more than 10 are still banned throughout continental Portugal. Dr Freitas highlighted the obvious problems of joining many people together in close contact, particularly when eating and drinking were involved because it meant guests would have to remove their masks. “Try to fraternise less in this stage when the virus is very active in Portugal and Europe,” she said.
‘Total availability’ to review pandemic measures
The government is not ruling out tightening pandemic control measures next week, Público reports. The government considers the spike in cases over the past few weeks to be a natural result of people returning to work and school. But Minister of State for the Presidency Mariana Vieira da Silva, while reiterating a desire to avoid a total lockdown, said the government had “total availability” to reevaluate the measures next week. Recently proposed measures include mandatory mask use outside the home, more rapid testing, local lockdowns and a traffic-light system to indicate high-risk coronavirus transmission zones, Ms Vieira da Silva didn’t speculate on any possible changes. President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa appealed for people to follow any measures that came to be introduced, Lusa reported. He said if the family Christmas gathering needed to be rethought, it would be. “It cannot be with 100 people in the family, 60, 50 or 30,” he said. “If necessary, split Christmas by the various components of the family.”
You’re probably thinking about covid risk all wrong
After sharing the CDC’s latest advice about the risk of being exposed to SARS-CoV-2 indoors, I thought I’d share this really useful rough guide to risk from The Age, in Australia. La Trobe University epidemiologist Hassan Vally says he sees examples all the time of people completely miscalculating what sort of covid risk they’re taking. The same people who push the traffic light button with their elbow, give people a wide berth on the street and sanitise their hands excessively often wear their masks wrong, jump on crowded public transport, head to the office to work or dine inside at restaurants. To be clear, don’t stop doing those things I listed earlier. The point of the article is to keep things in context. “I still feel there are a lot of people who think of risk in terms of this binary framework: something is either risky or completely safe," Dr Vally says. "If you think in those terms, the risk is you worry a lot about things that are very low risk. And if you worry disproportionately about the wrong things, you won’t worry about the right things.” Journalist Liam Mannix explains things relatively simply: the longer you spend close to someone, the higher your risk. If that contact is inside, in a poorly ventilated room, it’s about 20 times riskier than outside, he says.
Click through to the article for more information about risk. Graphic: The Age
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In brief
Teachers’ union says there are 122 schools with covid-19 cases. Here’s the list. (Diário de Notícias)
Madonna says she’s moving out of her house in Lisbon. It was on a joke FaceTime call with her dog, published on Instagram, so it’s hard to know how seriously to take things… (Observador)
Spanish government declares state of emergency for Madrid region. The power to limit circulation in the capital and nine other council areas is an “attack” on Madrid residences, the regional government says. (Público)
Almost 400,000 Portuguese families stopped paying off their loans. (Diário de Notícias)
Global business leader poll crowns New Zealand as best pandemic manager. Japan, Taiwan, Singapore, Thailand and Australia were also lauded, while the UK and USA landed in ninth and 10th place despite suffering tens of thousands of deaths. (Stuff.co.nz, in English)
On a lighter note
After a rocky start, 2020 is shaping up to be a bumper year for thousands of Portuguese bicycle makers, Reuters reports. Nearly 8000 workers were furloughed when nearly 40 factories were closed for two months as the pandemic first hit. But as people search for any possible alternative to public transport, demand is skyrocketing and Portugal, Europe’s leading bike manufacturer, is inundated with orders. Europe’s largest bike factory, owned by RTE Bikes in Gaia, Portugal, is pumping out 5000 bikes a day, up from 3000-4000 last year. “It turned out to be a blessing in disguise for us,” executive board member Bruno Salgado said.
Photo: Jorge Branco
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