• Direct. Last minute

Catalonia woke up this Thursday from the relative calm with which until now it faced the containment of the coronavirus. The Generalitat declared the "emergency" phase after the contagion spiked in the community and was forced to apply drastic measures to slow down the advance of the pandemic. The main ones consisted of the closure from this very Friday, and for a minimum of 14 days, of all kindergartens, schools, institutes and universities. A precaution that the Government led by Quim Torra had been resisting and that will affect 1.8 million schoolchildren. In addition, the confinement of 60,000 residents of Igualada and three adjacent populations was dictated after detecting a strong outbreak of the virus.

The Generalitat made these decisions after doubling the number of infected on the last day. This Thursday, 135 new positives were confirmed in the community, bringing the number of people diagnosed in Catalonia to 261, where six have died and 25 are hospitalized in serious condition.

The turning point took place on Wednesday night, when the Generalitat notified a virulent outbreak in Igualada, specifically at the hospital in this Barcelona town, which has already produced 58 infections -36 among health personnel- and the death of three elderly people who they were admitted with previous pathologies. In order to try to stop a greater community contagion, the Generalitat issued the first confinement in the Catalan territory and prevented the departure of the residents of Igualada and the adjacent towns of Vilanova del Camí, Santa Margarida de Montbui and Òdena from 21:00 on Thursday. Failure to comply with the order would imply committing a crime of disobedience.

The Igualada schools already woke up closed on Thursday and those of the rest of the community will do so on Friday, after the Cabinet of Torra decided to accelerate the measure after analyzing other scenarios, such as the educational centers holding open this week and closing its doors from Monday.

Finally, the urgency prevailed, something that caught the directors and teachers of the schools by surprise, who learned about the decision through the press conference delivered by the President of the Generalitat after noon, despite the fact that only a few hours before he had appeared and had not contemplated the imminent closure.

Unlike what happens in Madrid, the schools will remain completely closed, also for the professionals who work in them. Neither teaching nor administrative staff should attend the centers until March 27. The Minister of Education, Josep Bargalló, ruled out distance learning activities during the closing of the centers, arguing that the most disadvantaged families do not have an internet connection in their homes, but there are many concerted centers whose teachers have been preparing materials for students for days. do not completely paralyze your academic activity for the next two weeks.

Torra made the announcement after a shameful and public accusation crossing between JxCat and ERC deputies. Taking advantage of the fact that the powers of Health and Education fall on the party of Oriol Junqueras, several neo-convergent parliamentarians accused their still members of Govern of inaction to continue wearing them down electorally. "If we foresee that in a few days we will have to take drastic measures to contain the virus, it would be better to adopt them now, without waiting for the situation to worsen," the Parliament's vice president, Josep Costa, wrote on social media. While the deputy of his party, Aurora Madaula, regretted that Catalonia "is not independent to close as Denmark", whose authorities closed schools on Wednesday, as did Madrid. “As public representatives that we are, we are presumed to have a greater responsibility. Let's try to avoid bar socializing », replied the ERC spokesman in Congress, Gabriel Rufián.

For his part, Torra boasted that he was acting with "generosity" to participate in the conference of regional presidents that will be chaired by Pedro Sánchez. The President of the Generalitat announced yesterday that, as an exception, he will "put off" his decision not to attend multilateral meetings to demand a bilateral relationship between the Government and the Generalitat. However, this relationship was vindicated this week when it demanded to maintain - even if by videoconference - the negotiating table on the "Catalan conflict" despite the coronavirus crisis that completely occupies the Executive.

The closure of the schools decreed by the Generalitat will be added to that of all the municipal facilities in Barcelona, ​​that is, libraries, sports centers or children's playrooms, which the Cabinet led by Ada Colau agreed yesterday. The mayor of the Catalan capital also announced her isolation after coming into contact with a municipal worker who tested positive for coronavirus.

The Ciudad Condal will also see its main icon, the Sagrada Familia basilica, closed, which this Friday will close to the public until further notice, after it had initially chosen to limit its capacity to 1,000 simultaneous visitors, taking into account the limitations of the Generalitat.

The Govern also approved economic compensation measures, such as assuming the cost of telephone 061 - which until now was paid by the citizen - or enabling credits of 1,000 million for affected small and medium-sized companies.

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Know more

  • Catalonia
  • Madrid
  • ERC
  • Pedro Sánchez
  • Quim Torra
  • Oriol Junqueras
  • Gabriel Rufián
  • Denmark
  • Barcelona
  • Ada Colau
  • Coronavirus
  • Covid 19

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