The President of the Government of the Canary Islands, Ángel Víctor Torres, has warned this Friday that the island of Tenerife is close to confinement as it is close to alert level 4 set by the interterritorial commission of Health, when the Canary Islands as a whole are at level 2.
In a press conference held after the meeting of the Security Board with representatives of Fecam, Fecai and the security forces, among others, he once again asked citizens for responsibility to "bend the curve of infections" and the "maximum involvement" of the police forces.
The president has described as "unacceptable" the deaths of 20 people on the islands in recent weeks, 17 of them in Tenerife alone, with the "family heartbreak" that this entails, and specified that the measures taken on the island are "to save lives." Along these lines, he pointed out that sometimes "more emphasis is placed on infections and less on those who die" and these are "forceful and dramatic" data.
"Those who are irresponsible will pay for it with sanctions, the highest we have," he said, expressing his conviction that in the next 15 days the situation will be "turned around" and announced that this afternoon an extraordinary order will be published in the Official Gazette of the Canary Islands (BOC) with all the new restrictions that will affect the island from this Saturday.
Torres has remarked that both Santa Cruz de Tenerife and La Laguna are among the 10 Spanish cities with the highest rate of infections, something that "distorts" the average of the Canary Islands.
"We cannot look the other way," he said, stressing, however, that all the measures taken have been validated by the scientific committee that advises the Canarian Government and the Public Health Directorate itself and when they have "the relevant data." "If Tenerife were at level 1 or 2 we would not apply them, but there are already other communities making decisions that show that the Canary Islands has once again moved ahead," he said.
Torres has not hidden that "difficult times" are being experienced because the next 15 days are those of "greatest internal transit in the Canary Islands", either for shopping or for visits to the homes of family and friends, coupled with the fact that classes are ending, he understands that the measures "aim to restrict movements as much as possible."
Thus, he indicated that the philosophy is to "enter and leave the island as little as possible", and there will be screening points in airports and ports and tourists will also come with negative PCR or antigen tests.
The president has reported that public transport will operate at 50%, restaurants will be closed indoors and with 50% capacity on the terraces, shops with 30% of the public per floor and parking lots will also be reduced by half.
"You have to go out as little as possible"
"These are weeks of shopping, but you have to go out as little as possible, I make a call for us to stay at home and I also launch it to the rest of the 7 islands because there will be similar mechanisms if infections rise," he said.
He also recalled that sport is reduced to individual practice and outdoors and Christmas meals on key days are limited to six people and two cohabiting units, with a curfew set at 10:00 p.m. --at 00:30 a.m. on those days--.
Regarding the impact of the new restrictive measures on the hotel industry, he commented that we have to wait until Tuesday to know the "shock plan" that the central government is going to launch for this sector, plus tourism and commerce, and evaluate what additional measures the Canarian administrations can contribute.
Regarding tourism, he indicated that "it is essential" for the Canary Islands, and maintains that the ERTEs will have to be extended, as well as approving a "shock plan" to maintain it because he is convinced that it will be "recovered" although "it will not be immediate" because if the pandemic grows both in the Canary Islands and in the issuing countries, the activity decreases, but he also assumes that "the arrival of the vaccine is key."
