With the vaccine and in summer, is Spain entering the fifth wave of coronavirus?

End-of-year trips put management under control pandemic in Spain and become the prelude of a fifth wave of coronavirus, a virus that settled here at the end of January last year and which has already infected, according to official figures, nearly four million Spaniards diagnosed by system health, although there may be more.

The outbreak of contagions which originated weeks ago on the friendly coasts of Mallorca, where groups of young people celebrated the end of classes and the start of holidays, already affects eleven autonomous communities and once again places Spain in extreme danger: this Wednesday, the cumulative incidence It was 252 cases of coronavirus, diagnosed in the last 14 days, per 100,000 inhabitants.

And despite the fact that the Community of Madrid reported that this Wednesday no person infected with Covid has died here, several autonomies ask the Ministry of Health to consider again restricting mobility with curfews or suspensions of what is called here “nightlife”, that is to say bars and nightclubs open until late.

Catalonia, one of the regions most affected by the increase in infections, He has already warned that the restrictions will come back from the weekend.

“It is clear that we are entering a fifth wave and what worries the most is the upward slope of the incidence curve, ”he says. Bugle Quique Bassat, epidemiologist at the ISGlobal research center supported by the “la Caixa” Foundation and other academic and governmental institutions.

The epidemiologist adds: “Not only do thousands of new cases occur every day, but R, which is the parameter that best serves us to understand how transmission is evolving in our country, is above 2 in many places and it is very worrying ”.

According to Bassat, this fifth wave of the pandemic will have different characteristics what the Spaniards were already experiencing.

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“Not because of the numbers, which are going to be very high and I expect that they will continue to increase rapidly, at least for the next few weeks, but with markedly different clinical significance -clarified-. Fortunately, our most vulnerable are well protected and this is a guarantee that there will be few serious illnesses. But infection in younger people, although not traditionally associated with contracting a serious illness, can cause it exceptionally, ”he explains.

The sustained increase in infections, especially among young people aged 20-29, triggered the cumulative incidence in this age group up to 717 cases of coronavirus per 100,000 inhabitants.

“We are starting to see an increase in hospitalizations and increasing intensive care admissions, says Bassat. At a very different rate than what we’ve seen in the past, but that doesn’t mean young people are invulnerable as some of them get seriously ill. “

The epidemiologist undertakes to vaccinate the youngest as soon as possible: “It is necessary to vaccinate from the age of 16 and as quickly as possible. If somehow we do not intervene in the transmission that is taking place among our youngest, there will continue to be transmission and difficulties in containing this fifth wave, ”he says.

“We may have to back down on some measures. Parties, celebrations, concerts are pure dynamite for there to be transmission. Consequently. we will have to contain some of these activities again, ”explains Bassat.

PB