Italy poised for 2-week extension of Covid-19 lockdown

Italy’s death toll continues to rise, as the national doctor association announced on Monday that 63 doctors have died, while the Italian Institute of Health reports that 8358 healthcare workers are infected with Covid-19, a jump of 595 from the day before.

In front of the Emergency entrance to a hospital in Torrevieja, Spain MANUEL LORENZO/AFP

Not all the doctors had been tested for coronavirus, but the institute said they were from the hardest-hit Lombardy region in the north of the country, and their deaths have been attributed to the disease.

Reuters cites nearly 11,000 deaths in Italy alone, while 97,689 people have been infected, the second-largest number of cases worldwide.

Italian health officials said that the number of new confirmed cases fell on Sunday, but it was not enough of a push to roll back the lockdown restrictions. They believe Italy will be under lockdown for another two weeks.

Spain looks to the positive

The number of Covid-19 cases in Spain over the past five days are on track to surpass China with a total of 85,195 infected and 7,340 deaths.

New cases have risen 12 percent per day, a downward trend from 20 percent last week.

Spanish paper El Confidencial has reported that 16,780 people have been cured, which includes 2,071 within the last 24 hours.

The 6,400 confirmed cases on Monday were a downturn in numbers from the week before, with the hope that their upward curve is flattening, according to Foreign Minister Arancha González.

Europe has the highest amount of cases

Since Covid-19 appeared in China in November, some 35,000 people have died worldwide, with Europe bearing the brunt of the majority of cases.

According to the latest number from Agence France Presse newswire, 26,076 have died on the continent, with Italy in the majority with 11,591 dead, followed by Spain.

The pandemic has hit 183 countries and territories, but researchers say that the total of 740,000 infected is probably higher, as a number of countries are not testing suspected cases.