SPANISH holiday islands Tenerife, Gran Canaria and Fuerteventura have been placed on new special measures in a bid to contain the spread of coronavirus.
The Government of the Canary Islands has introduced new preventive measures for the three islands with effect from today, which include curfews and limited capacity at hotels and beaches.
The new rules in Spain are described as "specific and temporary measures to contain the spread of infections caused by SARS -CoV-2" and won't be removed until cases drop again.
The islands will have a tighter curfew to limit the freedom of movement of people at night, with restrictions from 10pm to 6am – instead of 11pm to 6am.
The maximum number of people at gatherings is set at four, except in the case of cohabitants, while indoor and outdoor terraces at hotels and restaurants will be at 50 per cent of their capacity.
Buffets or self-service are banned while tourist activity capacity is just 20 people
Beaches are also affected – capacity has dropped to 50 per cent occupancy and the groups of people together who do not live together will be four or less.
The Canary government says these measures are additional to the raft of other regulations still in force on all of the islands.
They are being introduced following an increase in cases which health chiefs are attributing to Christmas and New Year celebrations, as well as carnivals which were allowed to go ahead, particularly in February.
Coronavirus figures on Tenerife in particular have been rising, falling and then rising again over the last few months and the islands have been on different levels of alert.
On Sunday, the Ministry of Health confirmed 151 new cases of coronavirus COVID-19 and one more death.
The accumulated incidence at seven days in the Canary Islands stands at 62.88 cases per 100,000 inhabitants and at 14 days at 118.51 cases per 100,000 inhabitants.
By islands, Tenerife added 69 cases with a total of 18,221 accumulated cases, with 2,255 still active; Gran Canaria has 17,817 accumulated cases, 73 more than the previous day and 1,885 active.
Lanzarote added a new case with 4,520 accumulated and 81 epidemiologically active whileFuerteventura has 1,824 accumulated cases with seven more cases than the previous day and 295 active.
To date, a total of 911,966 PCR tests have been carried out in the islands.
Hoteliers say they are desperate to get the tourism season kickstarted and have launched a new campaign to warn of the "critical situation" and calling for more financial aid for "drowning tourism businesses"
Greece has backed vaccine passports along with Cyprus to allow Brits to return, following Spain.
Portugal and Turkey want Brits to return without restrictions by the summer, even without vaccine passports or negative coronavirus tests.
Thankfully, UK holidays can go ahead from April 12.
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