Although many people don’t want to judge the pandemic by the number of new cases, for now it is still the indicator used globally, and today the Canary Islands have recorded their highest number of new cases since the pandemic began, with 513 in one day. 299 of these are in Tenerife, 143 are in Gran Canaria, 39 in La Palma, 29 in Fuerteventura, just 2 in Lanzarote, 1 in La Gomera, and none in El Hierro.
However, the good news is, as is the trend in this current situation, there have been no deaths reported today, and hospital admissions have decreased, which many believe is the way the pandemic should now be judged, but with cases increasing and until vaccination reaches more than 70% for herd immunity, we still have to be cautious.
This is why Boris Johnson is being criticised for ‘Freedom Day’ on July 19th by health experts as two main reasons cause the virus to spread: its transmissibility and human interaction.
As new variants start to take hold, including here in the Canary Islands where the Alpha (British) strain and the Delta (Indian) strain are on the increase, it takes less droplets to catch the virus making it easier to catch and spread, plus people meeting, touching, hugging, jumping around to football, and not wearing masks, makes it even easier still.
Why do we have to be cautious, because, yes, at the moment hospitalisations and deaths are lower because we have the vaccine as extra protection, but we don’t know yet what effect these new strains will have when they come in larger numbers, and the age group doing all the above don’t want to be vaccinated.
Until new indicators are agreed, we need to find a way to lower the spread, as the incidence rates are spiralling out of control as you can see below, and we all want normality and tourists back, as we live on an island that depends on people coming and going from… however, it needs to be safely.
