MADRID (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 17th July, 2020) The Spanish Health Ministry said on Thursday that it had recorded 580 new coronavirus cases nationwide in the past day, the highest daily increase since May 10.
Another 8,313 people tested positive for the virus in Spain in the past two weeks, more than a half of them in the northeastern region of Catalonia and 1,076 in neighboring Aragon. Nine patients died in the past seven days.
But regional statistics paint a different picture. Catalan authorities recorded 1,300 new cases in the past day, 884 of them in Barcelona and the suburbs. That figure includes positive PCR antigen and antibody tests, while the ministry only counts people who had a positive PCR test.
Aragon authorities confirmed 272 new cases in the past 24 hours, including 115 asymptomatic patients. The region's main city of Zaragoza accounted for 175 of those cases.
Fernando Simon, the chief epidemiologist leading the central government's response to the pandemic, described the situation in Catalonia and Aragon as "concerning." He estimated there were 158 clusters of infection across the country, with a rise in infections in fruit pickers.
Spain is one of Europe's worst-hit countries. It has so far confirmed 258,855 cases and 28,416 virus-related deaths. An official study conducted by the Health Ministry shows that some 2.3 million people in the country had antibodies to COVID-19, or 5.2 percent of the population.
