Torrevieja University Hospital serves 11 municipalities in the Vega Baja. One out of every four PCR tests is carried out on people from outside the Valencian Community.
40% of all positive cases of coronavirus detected in recent weeks in the Torrevieja Health Authority are of people from outside the Valencian Community while 25% of the tests to detect coronavirus are also being carried out on patients from other autonomous communities.
This is as a result of the influx of tourists, coinciding with the summer season, where thousands of residents who have their home on the coast, in Torrevieja, Guardamar, Pilar de la Horadada and Orihuela Costa, are spending the summer months in these towns.
The Torrevieja Health Department provides health care to some 180,000 inhabitants in the municipalities of San Fulgencio, Rojales, Formentera del Segura, Benijófar, Rojales, Guardamar del Segura, Los Montesinos, San Miguel de Salinas, Pilar de la Horadada, Torrevieja, Orihuela Costa, the Oriolana district of Torremendo and the macro-urbanization of Entrenaranjos, also in Orihuela. Although the foreign resident population is much smaller this summer in the Vega Baja, due to the pandemic and the restrictions of several countries, national tourism is just as busy as ever, tripling the population on the coast.
It is among this group of national residents that a large number of positive cases have been detected through PCR tests, in the most case from Madrid, the Basque Country, Murcia and Castilla-La Mancha, the autonomous communities from which the largest number of national residential tourism comes.
In the last 14 days, with figures confirmed yesterday by the Ministry of Health, there are a total of 52 positive cases for coronavirus in the Torrevieja Health Department, which has registered a total of 59 deaths since the pandemic began.
Although the cases increased at the beginning of the summer, the situation now is currently more normal. The current infection rate is lower than it was two weeks ago. Most of the cases detected are mild or asymptomatic, in fact there is only one person currently admitted in the Torrevieja Hospital.
In the case of the Torrevieja Health Department, where there is a large elderly resident population, both local and foreign, the average age of infection is higher than the national average. Currently the average age in Spain of people infected by Covid-19 has dropped to 39 years, but in the 11 municipalities of the Torrevieja health department it is 61 years.
The Torrevieja Health Department now holds fortnightly meetings with the mayors and councillors of Health of the towns it serves, where it provides detailed information on the incidence of the coronavirus in the area.
