Madrid

The Minister of Health has detailed the restrictions to be followed by the Community governed by Díaz Ayuso after sending him in the early hours of the morning a ministerial order "of obligatory compliance".

Under the new regulation Madrid and cities of more than 100,000 inhabitants with an accumulated incidence of over 500 Covid-19 cases must apply new restrictions in order to slow down the pandemic. The new mobility limitations are obligatory even for the autonomous communities that voted against these. The government of Madrid is evaluating the option of appealing the order before the National Court.

The Spanish government has warned that Madrid's residents will face "serious risk" if the city's authorities don't implement tougher Coronavirus restrictions.

Spain's Health Minister Salvador Illa said that Madrid's authorities need to "put the health of citizens first" and to control the pandemic as "there is a serious risk for inhabitants, for the neighbouring regions." Illa urged authorities to "act with determination."

The Governing Council of the Community of Madrid has decided this Wednesday to ask the central Executive for the intervention of the Army in the region to help exercise the Covid-19 virus containment strategy.

Government spokesperson and vice-president, Ignacio Aguado, has stated that they "have decided to formally request from the Government of Spain in a meeting this Thursday urgent military logistical support for the installation of tents, testing and disinfection work in each of the basic health areas with restrictions in place".

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez met Madrid regional premier Isabel Díaz Ayuso on Monday to coordinate measures against the spread of the new coronavirus, as the Madrid region has become the epicentre of the Covid-10 crisis in Spain, with more than one-third of all newly reported infections.

Sánchez stated that "Madrid needs a special plan."

The harshness of the second wave in the Community forces a change in the political climate, and the face-to-face between Pedro Sánchez and Isabel Díaz Ayuso signalled a thaw in months of frosty relations.

Madrid, one of the worst-hit regions in Spain, will introduce targeted lockdowns and other restrictions in areas with faster spreading Covid-19 infections.

"Madrid wants to flatten the curve before the arrival of autumn and the complications that cold weather could bring," so deputy regional health chief Antonio Zapatero, adding that regional lockdowns will most likely affect southern, working-class neighbourhoods where Covid-19 infections have been rising since August.

Even though Spain sees a surge in Coronavirus cases, Health Minister Salvador Illa rules out a second lockdown. Madrid will most likely also not be isolated, even though it currently is the most affected region.

Illa: "We’re seeing an increase in cases, but there’s no comparison with what we saw in March; the system isn’t overwhelmed. We need to take concrete measures and we are."

The Community of Madrid will reopen a hotel in the Las Tablas neighborhood where homeless people with mild covid-19 symptoms who have no housing resource to isolate themselves will stay.

These people will be referred by the municipal social services to stay in this hotel, with 120 beds, which will have health and social services personnel.

The unions CC OO, UGT, CGT and STEM have called for a teachers strike for the first days back to the classrooms and do not rule out making it indefinite, although they hope to reach an agreement before that.

They demand "a responsible return to the classroom" and are asking the regional administration for a decrease in the ratio of students per classroom by splitting up groups in order to respect safety distances. In addition they ask for an increase of teachers, cleaning, administration, social integration and complementary service personnel and increase in nursing staff in all schools.

The four unions called for "a plan for the compensation of inequalities; measures and resources for the correction of the digital gap; an endowment of all the necessary material resources and improvement of the infrastructures"

The Ministry of Health has reported 5,114 new Covid-19 cases on Tuesday, bringing the total number of people infected in the country since the start of the pandemic to 364,196. Two out of every five new positives have been diagnosed in the last 24 hours, while the rest correspond to the results of tests carried out in previous days and which have been communicated to the Health Department after the daily closing of its records.

Positive diagnosis tend to stabilize, although hospitalizations and ICU admissions increase.

Google has announced that it'll build a new subsea internet cable to connect the United States, the United Kingdom and Spain. The so-called "Grace Hopper" cable will be used to "better resilience for the network that underpins Google’s consumer and enterprise products" according to the press announcement.

The new cable connection will be the first private one for Google between the United States and the United Kingdom as well as Google's first one to Spain. The latter one will be connected to the planned "Google Cloud region in Madrid" and used to integrate it into the global infrastructure. Google has signed the contract with the subsea cable provider SubCom and expects the project to be completed in 2022.

After a 2:0 victory against Villareal, Real Madrid confirmed its 34th Spanish title at an empty Alfredo Di Stefano Stadium.

Since LaLiga resumed, after the Covid-19 break, Real has won all 10 of its games to open up a seven-point lead over second-place Barcelona.

In a show of support for the Black Lives Matter movement, Marcelo took a knee and raised his right fist after scoring for Real Madrid in their 3-1 win against Eibar.

The Prado, Reina Sofia and Thyssen-Bornemisza museums in Madrid reopened today after nearly three months of Covid-19 lockdown.

At the Prado, visitors were required to wear face masks, keep a distance of two meters apart during the visit and had their temperatures checked before entering the museum.

A visit to the famous museum is free during this weekend -- and half-price until September -- with tickets available online to the first 1,800 people

Real Madrid's soccer players, coaches and "main directors" agreed on a pay cut between 10-20% this year to help the club mitigate a decrease in income "as a result of the suspension of competitions and the paralysis of a large part of its commercial activities".

Madrid's basketball team also agreed on a voluntary pay cut.

On March 26, Maria Teresa of Bourbon-Parma (86), cousin of King Felipe IV, has died after being infected with the novel Coronavirus. She died in Paris and a funeral was held in Madrid on Friday. She is the first royal to die from Covid-19.