MADRID (Reuters) – Spain reported 4,708 new coronavirus infections in the last 24 hours on Friday, bringing its cumulative total to 566,326 — the highest in western Europe.
Spain has been regularly revising up its daily tallies and while Friday’s figure was a new record for initial infection reports since the end of its strict lockdown in June, it was below recent peaks seen in those revised tallies.
A week ago, for example, the initially reported figure was 4,500 but that was later revised up to more than 11,000.
Spain also registered six new deaths on Friday, bringing its total COVID-19 death toll to 29,747.
However, health emergency head Fernando Simon said on Thursday there seemed to be a slowdown in contagion in half the country’s provinces in the last few days and Spain could be looking at a stabilisation of new infections.
Recent infections have been more common among younger people who often develop no symptoms thanks to their stronger immune systems. The death toll, although back at levels last seen in late May, remains far below the March-April highs when daily fatalities often exceeded 800.
Since the restrictions on movement were lifted and mass testing began in late June, infections rose from a few hundred a day to thousands, outstripping other hard-hit nations such as Britain, Italy or France.
(Reporting by Andrei Khalip; Editing by Frances Kerry)
