So far, Portugal has come through the corona pandemic relatively well. But last week’s numbers are worrying. The greater Lisbon area is developing into a new hotspot. The government is now tightening the measures.
Portugal’s handling of the Corona pandemic was considered exemplary; an early state of emergency and extensive tests prevented scenarios such as that in neighboring Spain. But now the fear of a second wave is growing. Because the infection rate has been rising again, particularly in Lisbon, since the beginning of June, the government has announced a new lockdown for large parts of the metropolitan area.
The curfews will apply from July 1st, Prime Minister António Costa announced. The residents of the 19 affected communities in the metropolitan area will therefore only be allowed to go out to do shopping, go to work or see a doctor. During this time, only meetings of a maximum of five people will be permitted there. The districts in the center of Lisbon are not affected.
“The only effective way to control the pandemic is to keep people at home for as long as possible, always respecting social distance and all protection and hygiene standards,” Costa said at a press conference. With almost 18,000 cases of infection, the Lisbon region has been the most severely affected part of the country by Corona since Wednesday, for the first time since the pandemic broke out. Of the 311 new infections on Thursday, a good three quarters were reported in the metropolitan area. So far, the north around the city of Porto has been the focus of infection.
Partys als Spreading-Events
Since the beginning of June, the virus has spread mainly in the poor areas around Lisbon. There are cramped living conditions and poorer hygienic conditions, many residents rely on public transport. The last reported increase is also attributed to private celebrations. At a party at a campsite in the Setúbal district, at least 20 people were infected, reports the “Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung”. At an illegal party in the Algarve, more than 70 new infections had already occurred in early June.
Young people in particular have become the focus of attention. According to the Ministry of Health, the number of new infections among 10- to 30-year-olds rose by around 90 percent after the easing in early May. “Those who think they can go back to normal life have made a mistake,” Health Minister Marta Temido said earlier this week.
In total, Portugal has recorded more than 40,000 infections and more than 1,500 deaths related to Covid-19. That is not a particularly large number, but the trend is pointing upwards: on average, 347 new infections have been added daily in the last seven days, almost 24 per 100,000 inhabitants. In Europe, only Sweden and North Macedonia have worse incidences.
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