Murcia Today Weekly Bulletin 5th September

Covid Spain

This week the Covid crisis continues to extend across Spain, with cases rising nationally at the rate of 8,528 per DAY.

Last Friday Spain had 439,286 cases and on Friday 4th September the total had risen to 498,989, a difference of 59,703 cases in a week.

The total number of new cases in the last calender month has been 196,175.

The huge rise in this calender month can be seen more clearly going back a little further.

4th September: 498,989 (rise of 196,175 in a month)

4th August: 302,814 (rise of 52,269 from July to August)

4th July: 250,545 (1st June to 4th July rise of 10,907)

21st June; Spain leaves state of alarm:246,272

1st June: 239,638

This month there has been a huge rise and the numbers are accelerating, with several regions breaking their own highest number of cases per day on a  regular basis. Murcia still has a relatively low number of cases compared to many other regions, but now has almost four times as many cases as at its highest point during lockdown and has broken its own record for the most cases in a single day four times since the last bulletin.

The advance of the second wave of the epidemic in Spain, as it's now being openly called, is uneven, and the degree of the "second surge" depends very much on the region. The principal regions with the biggest problems are Madrid, Catalonia, Aragon and the Basque Country, all of which are experiencing particular virulence, but cases are rising right across Spain as the two visuals below show all too clearly:

The number of deaths have risen to 29,418, an increase of 524 between Monday and Friday this week.

The Health Ministry maintains that the majority of the cases are asymptomatic and mild and do not require hospitalisation.

However, the numbers requiring hospital treatment are slowly creeping upwards as well; at the end of last week the percentage of hospital beds occupied by covid patients was 5%, and it’s now 7%.
There are currently 7,392 patients admitted for Covid-19 throughout Spain and 976 in an ICU intensive care unit. In the last 24 hours there have been 1,070 new admissions and 852 patients have been discharged.

The volume of news coming from across Spain relating to Covid is absolutely overwhelming, although several recurring themes keep coming up which we'll examine a little closer further down.

As an illustration, here are just some of the headlines from Friday 4th September relating to Spain:

Cases in Castilla la Mancha increase by 769 in last 24 hours.

Canary Islands sets record for new cases in a  single day; 382.

The Region of Madrid notifies 2254 cases and 20 deaths today.

Parliament of the Balearic Islands suspends activity next week as 12 deputies go into quarantine and notifies 230 cases and one death.

Andalucia reports new record level of cases for second consecutive day; 1021 new cases and 7 deaths in the last 24 hours.

68% of Spanish say they would be vaccinated when a covid vaccine is available.

Judge backs further restrictions in Valladolid, Castilla La Mancha.

WHO does not expect large-scale vaccinations until the middle of 2021.

The Catalan doctor who has tested the "Oxford vaccination" believes it will be ready for distribution by Christmas.

Madrid investigating negationist doctor for issuing false certificates to those not wanting to wear a mask.

Bolaños de Calatrava in Ciudad Real confined.

Canary Islands tourist businesses working on scheme to finance PCR tests for tourists from October to try and salvage something of the winter tourist season.( see below, this week Germany has added the Canaries to its high risk list due to rising cases, another massive blow for the islands' economy)

Catalan nocturnal leisure sector warns that without a rescue plan 37,000 jobs will be lost.

Catalonia reports 1465 cases and 10 deaths.

Galicia reports 5 deaths and 91 cases, bringing active cases up to 4082.

Two security guards on the Madrid metro attacked by users not wanting to wear a mask.

WHO reports 26 million cases of covid worldwide and 865,000 deaths.

Canary Islands imposing fines of up to 3,000 euros for repeated failure to wear a mask.

Spanish government and unions begin negotiations to extend the ERTE temporary redundancies scheme. There is broad agreement that the scheme will be extended but no agreement about the terms.

Aragón notifies 354 new cases.

Extremadura notifies 177 positives and five new outbreaks, one in a residencia care home in Azuaga.

La Rioja has 29 active outbreaks and 4,993 in quarantine.

Spain developing rapid saliva test which gives rapid results without giving false positives.

714 new cases and 8 deaths in the Valencia region.

Any regions wishing to close schools will only do so after agreement with the central government. All week discussions have been underway to clarify the "what if's" relating to the return to school. This agreement covers the question of, "what happens if there is a major outbreak in a school, at what point is the school closed?".

Madrid imposes further measures to try and halt spread of the virus and recruits more tracers. The city is now standing out as the worst hit area of the country and is undertaking 18,000 PCR tests a day. Today it was announced that more "spaces" will be opened and prepared to ease the strain on hospitals as case numbers increase. Further hotels have been allocated for health personnel to stay away from their families and to enable health personnel to quarantine away from their families. a number of additional restrictions have also been announced in the city to try and halt the spread of the virus.

Children's guardería (infant level) closed in Seville after director tests positive. This has sparked a lot of commentary today as children are on the point of returning to school and there is significant parental concern about the whole process. It hasn´t helped to allay fears that the Spanish media has widely reported that within three days of the "return to school" in France, that 22 schools have already been closed down and around 100 individual classrooms have been suspended due to cases of covid in teachers or pupils. The French education minister has said today that the authorities are not concerned as there are around 60,000 schools in France.

Castilla La Mancha reports 769 cases and one death.

Asturias  passes 1,000 new cases since the new normal began.

One month old baby hospitalised with covid in Pontevedra.

Two women taken off a plane in Lanzarote for refusing to wear a mask.

And on it goes, these are just a few of the headlines on one day.

Back to school

This week the topic has continued to cause a great deal of comment. At the beginning of the week, several regions announced that they would be delaying the return to school in order to give staff time to prepare classrooms and make changes following the decisions made last Friday nationally. Murcia is amongst the regions which has decided to delay the start of the new term and will be staggering the different age groups, with the younger children returning on the 14th September. Some municipalities are also staggering their own return to school.

The second point of debate has related to how parents will themselves cope with the task of balancing a sick child and their own work obligations and how businesses will manage the absence of staff should employees be obliged to take time off to quarantine with children.

It was finally confirmed that parents who do not themselves test positive in a PCR test but who have to stay at home to care for children who are in quarantine will not be able to request paid leave from work, the Minister of Finance and Government spokesperson, María Jesús Montero, said on Tuesday. This caused political uproar, the Podemos coalition partners of the PSOE national government adamant that this was not acceptable and that a mechanism must be found to help parents forced to quarantine with their children. By the end of the week the national government had backed down and accepted that a compromise must be found, although this will rumble on into next week before an agreement is made.

Parents caring for a child who tests positive for Covid-19 and who, therefore, will have to quarantine, will have the right to paid leave from work.

Parents who test positive for coronavirus themselves will also have the right to paid leave from work.

Another issue this week relating to schools has been the pre-testing of teachers. Schools in Holland, for example, returned earlier than Spain and are already experiencing difficulties due to a lack of teachers, as so many are testing positve. Murcia has said it will pre-test all teachers, but in Madrid the pre-testing of teachers caused a lot of comment this week as letters were sent to all teachers ordering them to report for testing; the result was chaos, enormous queues of teachers waiting to be tested. On the first day, the hygiene implications of this mass of teachers standing together caused testing to be rapidly suspended, and by the middle of the week the queues were being better controlled and the testing was able to continue.

Another point under discussion this week is potentially reducing the length of quarantine to 5 days. The German equivalent of Fernando Simón, has been talking this week about Germany considering a similar proposal and it makes economic sense for the government as funding potentially hundreds of thousands of teachers, health workers, staff and working parents to quarantine for 14 days is very expensive and it will all hinge around whether the Health Ministry believes this to be "safe". However, it is now on the table and being discussed, so may bring some changes to the period of quarantine required during the coming days.

Tourism

Mainland Spain is now on the no-travel or high risk list of so many countries that those working in the tourism sector along the Spanish costas are resigned to the difficult decisions that will have to be made within the next three weeks. How many remain open throughout September (and after that) depends entirely on the weather and whether the elderly populations from the major cities of Spain who normally take advantage of the good autumn weather and stay for a few more weeks, feel safer in their holiday apartments on the coast or feel that they have to return to the cities. However, international tourism is "dead" and many resorts are rattlingly empty at the moment.

This will inevitably lead to the temporary closure of facilities, for example the group running golf courses on the former Polaris World resorts here in Murcia have confirmed to Murcia Today on Friday that they will be closing the Hacienda Riquelme Golf Course on September 21st for the winter, due to the huge drop in reservations on courses for this autumn. This is just the tip of the iceberg, looking at the overall picture. Monthly tourism figures which came out this week confirm that Spain lost 75 % of its tourists and 79% of tourism revenue during July, and expenditure decreased by 79.5% compared to the same month last year, a loss of more than 19,000 million (19 billion) euros, absolutely supporting the view of the tourism sector that 100 billion euros of revenue will be lost this year.

So far this year, the United Kingdom still tops the list of foreign tourists with more than 2.4 million tourists despite an overall decrease of 76.9% and Germany was in third place with almost 1.8 million tourists, 72.9% less.

But this week Germany reviewed its travel restrictions once again and announced that the Canary Islands would be added to its red list,  a major blow for the local economy. TUI announced that it would repatriate German tourists from the islands by Friday as the Islands reported their highest covid figures to date.

Further misery came from Belgium, which also put all of Spain except Tenerife on its red list.

And this week restrictions continue to make life difficult for tourism; this week Galicia added Santiago de Compostela into the municipalities which must comply with additional restrictions to halt the spread of the virus, making the prospect of a pilgrimage along the camino de santiago distincty less appealing for the domestic market.

Losses in tourism sector initiate an early rise in unemployment for Murcia (and other regions):There has been no doubt since the covid lockdown began in March that 2020 was not going to be a good year for businesses, and following a summer of rising cases and falling tourist revenue, the chances of businesses being able to salvage a good autumn from the wreckage have evaporated for many business sectors.

It’s inevitable that job losses will follow this autumn, although the bulk of the cuts won´t really show until the October data is published.

Some businesses started to cut back during August, particularly in the tourist sector when the hoped-for summer visitors failed to manifest due to the quarantines imposed by principal tourist emissors (including the UK and Germany) and these first few cuts have started to show in the monthly employment figures published on Wednesday 2nd September. Normally August is one of the best months of the year for the Murcia Region 8and other coastal regions) due to the number of contracts issued to service the tourism sector, but this year unemployment has risen in the Region of Murcia by 1,781 people (1.52%) at the end of of August in relation to the previous month and 22,064 in relation to 2019 (22.76%), bringing the total number of unemployed to 119,019, of which 48,956 are men and 70,063 women.

Unemployment nationally increased by 29,780 people, 0.79% more. This increase places the total number of unemployed at 3,802,814, 24.04% more than a year ago, and makes this August the first in history to record an average rise in unemployment. The number of those paying into the social security system in August was 18,792,376, which means that Spain has about 450,000 fewer affiliates on average compared to February, just before the alert status was declared and about 528,000 less contributors than a year ago.

At the worst moment of the pandemic, between March and April, almost a million jobs were destroyed, of which a third have been recovered, excluding the more than 800,000 workers who remain on ERTE temporary redundancy schemes and are therefore not classed as unemployed although are technically not employed either. In other words, most of them are simply waiting to be made formally redundant.

As mentioned above, negotiations are now underway to try and extend the ERTE scheme into next year and avoid adding these 800,000 people to the list of the unemployed. The unemployment figures in the first week of October are likely to increase substantially.

The start of “a wave of mergers”
On Friday it was confirmed that Bankia and CaixaBank are in negotiations to merge.

On the 1st September former Spanish Minister of the Economy and Vice-President of the European Central Bank (ECB), Luis de Guindos, spoke at an economic forum in Santander about the potential implications of the growing economic crisis and warned that:“Cost reductions and consolidation have become much more essential because of the crisis”, his belief being that the start of a new wave of mergers was inevitable should there be a second wave of covid cases, “Mergers can be useful at a national level and at a cross-border level (…), and should be put into operation relatively urgently ”.

The Spanish Government is the majority shareholder in Bankia, with 61.8% of the capital, having merged together seven bankrupt banks during the last economic crisis in 2012, injecting more than 22,000 million euros to prop it up. The Sareb (commonly called the bad bank) sprang from this same operation, property assets hived off and sold/managed over the last 8 years to try and reclaim as much capital as possible from the housing, land and property portfolios seized by the banks due to loan defaults when the property bubble burst, a process which began in 2008, but intensified in 2010 and lasted until 2013.

The initial brief of the Sareb envisaged disposal of the assets within 2 years, but 8 years later, there is still a substantial bank of assets and the Spanish Government has been waiting for a chance to withdraw from Bankia, but has been unable to do so due to the ongoing fallout from the economic crisis and the length of time it has taken for the country to emerge from recession, the State unable to withdraw from Bankia, due to a persistent low level in its value.

So far, it has only recovered 3.3 billion euros from the initial injection.
CaixaBank, is Spain’s third largest institution, with nearly 10.9 billion euros in capitalization and 400 billion euros in bank assets, and Bankia, its fourth largest bank, with nearly 3.2 billion in capitalization and over 200 billion in assets.

Both banks have lost a significant part of their value since the Covid crisis began and published falling profits, but analysts believe that a merger is a mutually beneficial proposition, and both banks are well-aligned to offer advantages to the other.

A merger is thought to be the most practical option, although will undoubtedly lead to local job losses as branches are lost from the high street.

Both entities lodged their exploratory contacts at midnight between Thursday and Friday with the Madrid Stock Exchange regulator, and the stock market received the news positively.

Discussions are underway. Expanded article: Click here

It’s expected to be an autumn of mergers due to the declining economic situation.

Care homes

Care homes: The number of deaths in the first wave of covid in carehomes was one of the greatest tragedies of the pandemic and in spite of measures to try and reduce the impact, the number of cases notified in carehomes is climbing once again. During the last week alone Murcia has already reported 64 cases in six different care homes, and during Friday evening, that total increased to at least 74 as the numbers in the Caser home in Lorca continue to rise. Similar scenarios are being played out all over Spain and there are lots of them. Another example this week; Workers of a Granada care home confine themselves with the elderly after 12 covid positives are detected.

As care home cases rise, so will the death rate.

Measures are being taken to PCR test employees, limit admissions and test new admissions, limit visiting and isolate new cases rapidly, but there have been problems and it is known that some of the employees returning to work after summer holidays have not PCR tested and are now found to be positive. Unbelievably, this is happening in several places.

The problem of the homeless suffering from Covid also returned this week. During lockdown, many local councils literally rounded up the homeless on their streets and put them into centres so that they could be monitored. The same thing is starting to re-occur, albeit in a slightly different format, and in Madrid, the government has opened a dedicated hotel for the homeless diagnosed with covid so that they can quarantine.

Confinements

There is still a high level of fear that a national lockdown will occur in the near future, but the Government continues to deny that this is the case and insists that there will not be a national lockdown. This week the Health Minister again ruled out the possibility of a national confinement, insisting that the autonomous regional governments were doing a good job and could request localised state of emergency powers at a regional level should they deem it necessary; last week, the regions robustly rejected this government offer.

What is happening, is an increased level of localised confinements, and again, this is taking place all over Spain. A few weeks ago, a confinement was international news; looking back at the level of international media interest when A Marina in Galica was put back into confinement, it's interesting to see that now it barely even merits more than a line in the national media, so commonly is this mechanism now being used. This week in Murcia, for example, the regional government decided to confine Archivel in Caravaca de la Cruz. This is an outlying district with 1200 occupants but has an IA accumulated incidence rate of more than 1,000 per 100,000 of population which is huge, due to a group of young people holding a BBQ. The same restrictions have been applied as were used in Totana; no-one in and no-one out, in an attempt to bring the outbreak under control and the measure is being called a "flexibilised confinement" in order to gain the consent of the courts to this localised confinement, as technically, the regional government does not have the power to forcefully confine the population without using the state of emergency mechanism.

The courts are getting more accustomed to issuing these orders and although there have been difficulties at a local level, the regions are getting better at wording their requests and presenting a better case for these localised orders. A typical example of this occurred in the Valencia Region this week in Beniganim when the judge refused the first application for confinement and the regional government had to go back and re-word their application to get it through the courts. On the second occasion, the court granted the confinement application.

In other situations, specific increased restrictions are being imposed, an example being Salamanca and Valladolid in Castilla y León which were put back to level 1 this week and Madrid imposed tighter restrictions. Here in Murcia, the regional government has been classifying municipalities as "red level" and automatically banning visits to care homes, reducing the capacity in bars to 40% and closing day centres for the elderly in the affected municipalities. See further covid measures in four more municipalities. During this week these restrictions have been applied in six municipalities and it is quite likely that others will be added to the list after the covid monitoring committee meet on Monday due to the rising levels of cases in some areas. See Cases creeping up again in Mazarrón; health centre put on red alert

This type of localised additional restrictions and localised confinements seems to be the way forward this autumn, due to the huge financial implications of a wider lockdown which would cripple the economy, so although rumours are spreading amongst the expat community that army leave has been banned from the 18th onwards ready for a lockdown, it still seems improbable that this will happen, although of course, we are in unchartered territory with this covid virus and have to continue to react to changing circumstances.

Army testers

There has been continued uptake in the offer made by the government last week for military tracers to help the autonomous communities and on Monday the tracers are due to start work in Murcia, the Valencia Region and other regions and now 11 regions have asked for their help.The military will be called in to help build field hospitals and enforce movement restrictions as occurred in the spring as case numbers rise.

Transparent masks for the deaf

Marcos Lechet, deaf since the age of 5, delivered a petition to the Ministry of Health on Thursday, containing the more than 70,000 signatures that he has collected requesting the approval of transparent masks that allow lip reading, through a campaign on Change.org ('https: //bit.ly/3jBMlMP ') started on August 7th.“My name is Marcos, I am deaf and for a few weeks I have felt completely isolated. Until now, to communicate with other people, I read their lips, but suddenly I have found that everyone is covered by a mask. My doctor, the cashiers in my supermarket ... and what is harder: my family and my friends. I have not understood what they say for a long time. And like me, the thousands of deaf or hard of hearing people in Spain ", his request says.The goverment is now said to be considering the request as there are a number of masks on the market that could be used, but as yet, the health ministry has not yet approved any of them.

Hopefully that will change soon and remove the feeling of isolation for those affected.

Covid Murcia

On 21st June, when Spain came out of the state of emergency, Murcia had 87 cases.

On July 4th the region had just 74 cases.

By August 4th the region had 746 cases, a rise of 672 cases in a month.

Last week, on Friday 28th August the Region of Murcia had 2,876 cases and 159 deaths.

A week later, on Friday 4th September the total had risen to 4,432. and the deaths to 161, an increase of 1556 in a WEEK.

So this means that the number of cases in the Murcia region has risen by 3,686 cases in the last month.

It's worth bearing in mind that at the peak of the first wave in the spring, the highest level reached in Murcia was 1,049 active cases, so we have now quadrupled the number of cases in the region at its highest point.

In a way, that's where the news could stop, because these figures say it all, but we are in a very different place because the average age of the cases is a lot lower than when we were at the peak and the amount of testing underway is identifying the mild cases and asymptomatic cases in order to isolate them, whereas before, only the more serious cases were being detected and the milder and asymptomatic cases weren´t being detected at all.

On Saturday the La Opinión Spanish language paper lead with the headline; "Half of the beds in intensive care units are already occupied by patients with Covid", the problem being that here in the Murcia region we only have 115 intensive care beds in the whole of the region and 51 of them contain covid patients now, so it's a small step up before the regional health services are totally overwhelmed and are having to try and create more intensive care space.

Lorca, for example, can only handle 12 intensive care patients and is at full capacity, so is having to divert its covid patients requiring intensive care to other hospitals. Although it has more space on its general wards, covid patients have to be isolated, limiting the capacity of the hospitals to cope. Figures in Lorca have gone through the roof this week and the regional health authority admitted yesterday that it is "very worried" about Lorca. Increased restrictions have already been put in place a week ago and the climb in cases seems to be flattening off a little, but more serious measures may have to follow next week.

The biggest problem Lorca now faces is that the Caser care home has now reported 20 cases, the majority amongst its patients, and that figure is set to climb higher; one resident has already been hospitalised and should more follow it is easy to see how quickly the regional hospital services could become saturated, which will push the death rate upwards.

Logically, the more widespread the infections, the greater the chance of people who are considered to be at risk, ie those over 65 and those with pre-existing medical conditions, being exposed to the virus, so although the more mature expats who typically are those retiring to Murcia shouldn´t get themselves in a panic, it is important to be vigilant and take sensible precautions.

Fernando Simón told us on Friday that the average age of Covid cases is continuing to fall; the average for a man is now only 37 and 38 for a woman and the age group most affected by Covid is 20-49 followed by the 5 to 17 year olds; the over 65s are the least affected, although this age group generates the most deaths.

This is because young people are actively spreading the virus through parties, family gatherings and gatherings of groups and friends, the source of 49% of cases according to the regional health authorities this week, who have heavily criticised the younger members of the population for their "irresponsible attitude". The main increases in cases across the region are being attributed to this situation; by Friday Jumilla had become the municipality with the highest number of cases per capita of population, the rise fuelled by the fact that because the fiestas del vino had been cancelled to limit the spread of the virus, groups of young people gathered in private houses to celebrate their own fiestas, the result being a huge surge in cases in the municipality - ironically, the municipality is reportedly still holding 80 million litres of wine from last year which its bodegas have been unable to sell due to the lockdown in the bars and restaurants which normally buy it, so if the actions of these young people prolong the virus, it is their jobs which will be most at risk.

This is the same situation elsewhere, the surge in cases being linked to specific bars or family gatherings, the "I'm alright Jack" attitude of those less likely to suffer severe cases, literally killing the elderly and more vulnerable.

The regional government has this week extended the restrictions on bars, following the reporting of 430 new cases on Thursday alone and has now prohibited the sale of drinks and food to those sitting or standing at a bar, or using external hatches to order; clients must remain seated at a table.

Once the children go back to school next week, it will be very surprising if we don´t see dialogue turning into action and the police taking a much harder line against those not observing the hygiene measures and more local lockdowns.

For this reason it is surprising to see councils even contemplating holding events to bring young people together such as the bands weekend being held in Mazarrón this weekend, but as the autumn draws in, common sense may prevail and the rhetoric change into action.

Yesterday Totana closed two bars for continued violation of Covid hygiene regulations. On Friday police moved in and closed down two bars after repeatedly issuing warnings to bar owners and clients. Six further bars have been warned. Totana has only recently emerged from a confinement. Case numbers in Totana have been creeping back up again recently; on Friday the municipality notified a further 20 new cases and has reported 98 cases in the last 7 days, almost double the number it had when it was confined.

San Pedro del Pinatar increases police patrols as cases rise; Click to read

Los Alcázares closes off parks and exercise areas; Click to read

Torre Pacheco increases restrictions, closing sport centres, cultural centres etc. Click to read

Number of cases per municipality in the last two weeks as of Friday 4th and the IA rate, ie the rate per 100,000 of population for the last SEVEN days (which gives a better idea of the positioning of the municipality at the end of this week). The average for the region is now 156, so anything below that is good :

Abanilla 1/16 ( This means 1 case in the last two weeks and an IA rate of 16, so very low)
Abarán 21/77
Águilas 54/99
Albudeite 0
Alcantarilla 111/183
Los Alcázares 19/74
Alguazas 19/124
Alhama de Murcia 82/163
Archena 30/129
Beniel 14/53
Blanca 13/76
Bullas 13/78
Calasparra 8/68
Caravaca de la Cruz 73/178
Cartagena 382/95
Cehegín 18/86
Ceutí 60/169
Cieza 20/42
Fortuna 24/69
Fuente Álamo 117/373 (This means 117 cases in the last 14 days and an IA rate of 373 which is more than double the regional average, so not good).
Jumilla 149/414
Librilla 6/75
Lorca 741/384
Lorquí 54/364
Mazarrón 55/111
Molina de Segura 175/143
Moratalla 21/216
Mula 78/254
Murcia 1108/141
Ojós 0
Pliego 6/78
Puerto Lumbreras 24/84
Ricote 0
San Javier 63/107
San Pedro del Pinatar 53/125
Santomera 48/234
Torre Pacheco 87/179
Las Torres de Cotillas 64/167
Totana 174/315
La Unión 23/89
Villanueva del Río Segura 0
Yecla 28/58
Those from other regions diagnosed in Murcia 103
Total 4144 . Acumulated IA rate in the last 7 days: 156

Virgen de la Fuensanta stranded in Murcia cathedral as Romería is cancelled; Click to read

Price of almonds becomes the latest Covid victim: the extended lockdown and reduced numbers of clients during the summer months has played havoc with the price of raw almonds, as bars and restaurants have purchased significantly less to date this year, pushing down the price.The Federation of Agricultural Cooperatives of Murcia (FECOAM) says that prices of almonds have fallen by up to 40% in recent months, and currently markets are totally paralyzed, with no operations for the sale of conventional almonds (not organic). Click to read article

Other victims; there has certainly been an increase in "anger crimes" in the last few weeks, with the domestic environment a more dangerous place. This week we've had another nasty case of domestic violence with another woman murdered in her home by a former partner, this time a woman stabbed in Águilas. There was another upsetting incident in Calasparra on Friday when a man stabbed his son six times with a knife before committing suicide by jumping off the balcony of his third floor apartment following  a huge row, and I have to admit to not being able to write the story of the Alhama man who beat a cat to death in the street and threw it in the bin as the pictures and account were just too disturbing.

Crime rises: It's inevitable as the unemployment total rises that alternative revenue streams will be sought and recently the number of police reports about theft from unoccupied properties and robberies have increased. One old favourite form of theft re-surfaced this week, when police reported arresting a gang of Rumanians who specialised in ripping out cabling to sell the copper for scrap, a form of crime which was particularly popular during the last economic recession. This gang was very well-organised and carried out more than 20 robberies in Murcia and Alicante.Click to read

Other news

Residential property rental prices in Spain have risen above 50% in the last five years.

The demand for rental property in Spain is constant, the domestic market remaining strong due to the limited supply of available properties, a lack of investment into new constructions since the collapse of the property market in 2010 and the subsequent liquidity issues faced by developers resulting in only minimal investment into new housing projects during the last ten years.

In truth, the developers have only really started to see renewed interest in financing new developments in the last three-four years after Spain emerged from a bruising economic crisis in which property prices plummeted and the level of unemployment was high.

As the economy has recovered and job prospects improved, families have once again started to look at the possibility of moving or even buying their own homes, but the rentals market has remained strong, with availability exceeding demand.

This high demand and scarcity of supply has caused a growth of more than 50% in rental prices since 2015, according to a study by Fotocasa, which shows that the average price per square meter was 7.13 euros five years ago, but by June 2020 had risen to 10.82 euros. Click to read full article

Los Alcázares receives 2.8 million towards Gota Fría costs:

Los Alcázares council has reported that almost a year after the anniversary of the most serious floods that Los Alcázares has suffered in its history, the council has received a payment of 2.8 million euros towards the expenses it undertook to overcome the emergency in the town from the national Government.

An extraordinary session of the Municipal Plenary has authorised the payment of invoices to all the companies that participated in the huge task of removing the mud and sludge, pumping out water, urban pest control, vehicle collection, machinery contracting, security and maintenance of public buildings, replacement of signage and work on public roads, as well as undertaking repairs to the infrastructure damaged.

The Councillor for the Treasury, José Carlos Castejón, said that he " greatly appreciated the work carried out by the different companies that have been patient for twelve months”, and said the money had “not even lasted a week” in municipal coffers.

Meanwhile, efforts to clear ramblas in anticipation of autumn storms increase across the region; Torre Pacheco has put out a press release this week showing its efforts to prepare its waterways following the devastation suffered by the municipality last September. Click to read news

3.6 earthquake 10 kilometres below the Mediterranean off Cabo de Palos: this was actually felt more widely in the neighbouring Alicante province than in the Murcia Region. Click to read

Hotel on Hacienda del Álamo Golf Resort will re-open under new management: Hopefully it’s third time lucky for the former Sheraton Hotel which closed this spring at the beginning of lockdown and never re-opened, on the Hacienda del Álamo Golf Resort in Fuente Álamo as management of the hotel passes to TDI Advisors, a company managing luxury hotels in different areas of Spain.

The company offers a range of services, either directly managing hotels in areas such as Marbella, Nerja and Vera, asset managing larger complexes and hotels in various areas of Spain and in the enclave of Melilla and project managing.

A typical project would be the “Proyecto Calvía”, a repositioning and asset management project. This involves, “Repositioning and asset management of the joint venture between an investment fund and a listed hotel chain of seven hotels in Magaluf, with a change of brand associated with the establishments and with a noticeable improvement in both the type of client and the average price of the different assets .

Or the Proyecto Alicante, “Interim management of the asset, owned by a financial institution, with the reopening of the hotel establishment, the transformation of the asset and its profitability, ending with the sale of the asset to a hotel chain.”

The company collaborates with a wide range of established hotel brands and industry professionals. Click to read (this contains background information about the formation of the Sareb).

Fire bought under control in Mula and Bullas after 360 hectares are burnt. A major fire last weekend required the participation of 350 firefighters from neighbouring regions and the Military Emergencies Unit, burning 360 hectares. It took three days to bring it under control and a further three to thoroughly damp down. It's the biggest fire in the region this year and investigations are underway to clarify how it started.

The storm last weekend failed to deliver huge volumes of rain, but did yield spectacular images when lightning hit the Puente del Estacio bridge in San Javier which controls the entrance of marine traffic from the Mediterranean into the Mar Menor and there was also a spectacular image of Lorca as heavy rain moved in taken from the castle which attracted a great deal of comment.

Sadly, there was also plenty of comment about the small amount of rain which did fall, some of which made its way into the Mar Menor.....

Have a good week, thank you for your support and stay safe!