Spain revises coronavirus death toll to over 28,000
Spain's health ministry reported on Friday a total of 28,313 coronavirus deaths, after adjusting its database to remove duplications and errors, and said that there were still nine active clusters across Spain.
The death toll had not been updated since June 7, when Spain reported 27,136 deaths, while the country was implementing a new methodology for logging deaths and cases.
The new number, which also showed 53 new deaths in the past week through Thursday, is still lower than before the first major revision in late May, when the health ministry lowered the death toll by nearly 2,000.
Spain is preparing to end its state of emergency on Saturday, which will allow free travel across the country and the opening up of its borders to much needed tourism.
As the focus has changed from reining in the pandemic through a strict lockdown to keeping the coronavirus in check via early detection of localised outbreaks, Spanish regions have been reviewing their statistics to resume case-by-case reporting to the health ministry.
Around 34 coronavirus clusters had been detected in the past month-and-a-half, Health Minister Salvador Illa told a news conference, but the number has come down significantly of late.
"Nine clusters are still active, but all are under control," Illa said, explaining they had been reported in slaughterhouses, but also in nursing homes, from parties, in groups of seasonal workers, or were related to neighbouring Portugal. (Reuters)