Spain to monitor Covid in the same way as flu from next year

The Ministry of Health and regional governments have agreed a gradual change in public health monitoring which will also change the way Covid-19 is handled. In the next few weeks Spain will enter a transition period in which the focus will be placed on the most severe and vulnerable cases instead of the whole population, before the new system comes into force in a year’s time.

In this first phase, the monitoring system to detect increased incidence in the population in general will continue, and will enable new variants to be detected early and vaccine effectiveness to be measured. PCR and rapid flow tests will continue to be carried out, but the data on which the health administrations make decisions (such as restrictions) will be based on the most serious cases and hospitalisations rather than accumulated incidence or the overall number of infections.

Then in the first quarter of next year, significant variations will come into effect. The system used will be similar to those that detect outbreaks of flu, by looking at a representative sample of the population; it could be by age, gender, or where they live. This data will be used to see how infections develop, and whether they are minor, severe or a major outbreak.

The details of this new system have been set out in the Zaragoza Declaration, a document signed by the Ministry of Health and the regional governments. The Minister, Carolina Darias, said it will serve to strengthen public health monitoring, will have sufficient funding and will improve coordination between the regions.

The Secretary of State for Health, Silvia Calzón, said this method is more sustainable in terms of time and efficiency. “It can provide extremely important information about the evolution of infections and the patterns of serious illness," she said.

With regard to the proposal for masks no longer to be compulsory inside buildings, there were so many different opinions at this meeting in Zaragoza, that the debate has been postponed to a later date.