Spain’s Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska said during a press conference Tuesday that more than 900 citizens have been arrested for defying the government’s orders to stay inside amid the coronavirus pandemic.
In total, 926 arrests have been made, and 102,000 police reports have been filed in Spain during the pandemic, which has killed almost 3,000 people in the country and infected 40,000 more, according to El Pais.
Grande-Marlaska added that despite 130 arrests and more than 20,000 new police reports on Tuesday alone, most Spanish residents are respecting the state of alarm issued roughly 10 days ago.
Spain’s coronavirus death toll surpassed that of China, according to a Ministry of Health announcement Wednesday, after a 20% spike in infections from the previous day. More than 5,000 people in the country have recovered.
Patients’ needs have overrun the healthcare system in Spain. Officials have been forced to erect makeshift hospitals, and an ice rink in Madrid was recently transitioned into a morgue after funeral homes were unable to house all the dead bodies.
Hospitals in #Spain are so overcrowded that #Coronavirus victims are simply lying on the floor.
Where is @WHO in all of this death and destruction?pic.twitter.com/8H35XKYd8d
— Prof. Steve Hanke (@steve_hanke) March 23, 2020
More than 450,000 cases of the coronavirus have been confirmed worldwide, resulting in more than 20,000 deaths and more than 112,000 recoveries.
