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The Government has stopped the opening of the field hospital set up by the Civil Guard in Sant Andreu de la Barca (Barcelona). The Minister of Health , Alba Vergés , maintains that the space "does not meet the needs of the municipality's health system today." The reference hospital in Sant Andreu de la Barca is that of Martorell , where the situation is worrying: it has 193 cases of coronavirus, of which 112 correspond to health workers who report the lack of protective materials.

The City Council, led by Enric Llorca (PSC), insists the Generalitat in its offer and says that it has available both the sports center's field hospital and a medicalized hotel. The attitude of the Govern has been censured by an association of the Civil Guard.

Sant Andreu de la Barca has housed the headquarters of the Armed Institute in Catalonia since 1992. Until the illegal referendum of October 1, 2017, the Civil Guard and the population had been in tune. A few days ago, the City Council built a 140-bed hospital in the municipal sports center in collaboration with members of the Barcelona Civil Guard Command, the Reserve and Security Group and the NGO Doctors Without Borders . The aid and the material were transferred by the Armed Institute.

The town has a second center with 47 beds in a medical facility, the Bristol hotel . The two facilities are equipped with sanitary material to care for coronavirus patients, according to municipal sources. They also have staff to attend to patients who have not yet arrived.

The head of Catalan health disparages facilities set up in Sant Andreu de la Barca. As he argued the previous week to justify that the Generalitat was not going to open the field hospital enabled by the Army in Sabadell , Vergés states that "it is important to work things well and, above all, according to the needs of the health system" . Thus, in Sant Andreu de la Barca neither of the two temporary facilities such as those that have come into operation in Barcelona and Sabadell, among other Catalan municipalities, will be put into operation.

The refusal of the Generalitat to open the centers set up by the Sant Andreu de la Barca City Council coincides with the collapse of the municipality's reference hospital. At least 112 toilets have been infected at the Hospital de Martorell, which denounces the lack of protective material, especially waterproof coats. The staff has shared photos of them dressed in black garbage bags . According to union sources, "some days gowns are missing; others, masks."

The mayor of Sant Andreu de la Barca avoids making statements because he prefers not to fuel the controversy, but the City Council has once again transmitted to the Generalitat that the two centers are "available" with medical supplies. "From the first moment it has been like this," said municipal sources. "We reiterate our willingness to collaborate with Health in order to contribute to the well-being of the population," they abound, given the rejection of the Generalitat. "Above the possible differences between administrations and organizations, the well-being of the citizenry must prevail", they underline from the City Council, which insists that the two authorized field hospitals have "the same functional plan, drawn up by the same team, than the medicalized hotel in Martorell that has entered service this week ".

The Unified Association of Civil Guards (AUGC) requires the Generalitat to speed up the opening of the field hospital in Sant Andreu de la Barca. Otherwise, the entity will demand that the Government intervene. According to its spokesman, Juan Fernández , "in moments of a health crisis and a social emergency where the support of all citizens is being requested, it is precisely an administration that shows an unequivocal attitude that is not in accordance with the emergency situation that we are living".

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  • Civil Guard
  • Barcelona
  • Catalonia
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