Madrid registers 1,164 deaths in residences in just five days in March

The end of March has brought the most serious number of all those who have suffered in Madrid residences in terms of deaths: almost 1,200 elderly people died between March 26 and 30. Specifically, in these last five days alone, 1,164 deaths have been registered, coinciding with the dates when deaths from Covid-19 began to skyrocket in Spain and reached maximum levels practically every day.

The data, which has been exclusively accessed by EL MUNDO, refer to 294 residences in the Community of Madrid, public and private, and demonstrate the harshness of the situation, especially in 46 of them. Those 46 have suffered figures that have decimated their elders.

Among the residences that have had the most deaths is Monte Hermoso, the residence that appeared in all the news a few days ago due to the massive death of the elderly in a single day, which has lost 48 people from its 130 places, with the particularity that deaths occurred in a period of just 48-72 hours; the Casaquinta residence, in Ciempozuelos, with 320 beds, which has suffered 42 deaths; or Francisco de Vitoria, also from Alcalá de Henares, who has lost 38 tenants, and has 526 places.

Last week two facts were made public: on the one hand, the data of deaths in residences until March 25 included. The total figure was 1,065 deceased elderly people, which represented about 165 more than usual in the same period of the previous year. In other words, it is taken for granted that on a normal March, until the 25th, 900 elderly people may die for various reasons. And since the pandemic is in, in that period there were 165 more deaths. However, the following five days have brought a much higher number: 1,164 dead. The regional president herself, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, has raised to 3,000 the number of deaths in residences this March in an interview this Thursday on Cadena Ser.

The second piece of information known last week was that the Madrid president, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, decided to remove the counselor for Social Policies, Alberto Reyero, from the control of the residences. Ayuso established a "single command" in charge of the Ministry of Health to coordinate all actions on the residences.

It must be remembered that Reyero, a Cs deputy, decided to ask for help from the Armed Forces to the central government, thus contradicting Ayuso's public position, which days before had said in an interview: "This petition is useless because the Army does not have the capacity to send toilets, it does not have the capacity to only reach 500 residences in Madrid, not to mention all over the country ».

The fact is that the advance of the virus has continued relentless these days, and it has continued to concentrate on the weakest sector of the population. It is true that it is impossible to attribute all deaths to the coronavirus, since hardly any tests are being carried out on the living, let alone the deceased.

From the data that this newspaper has accessed, the terrible situation of the residences with the corpses can be extracted: most of the dead have died in the residences themselves, with percentages of around 75% of the deaths. The rest have died in hospitals in the region.

This has caused some very problematic situations for the workers of the residences, who have found themselves overwhelmed with many deceased from one day to the next and the consequent problems caused by the removal of these bodies, which have to be transferred by funeral homes, the Army or firefighters. .

Given these unacceptable figures, Mortuary Health, which coordinates the death policy in Madrid during this crisis, sent an email to all residences saying that they had to notify if a funeral home had not gone to collect the bodies in six hours. However, with these numbers it is impossible to meet deadlines, and sometimes these collections have taken two or three days.

For a few days, a "crash plan" has been in place for Madrid residences, which consists mainly of evaluations and disinfection, but it is still starting. The proposal that was raised earlier this month to medicalize residences, parallel to another package, other measures such as medicalizing hotels, has also failed to stop the bleeding.

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