• The Popular Group requests that the report be made by province, and with weekly data from March 1
The Popular Parliamentary Group in Congress today demanded that the Government, by means of a proposal not of law, audit the number of deaths from coronavirus in Spain, with data by province, weekly, and broken down by age range, since last 1 March, because having reliable data is a requirement of democratic quality.
The GPP claims that said data be published classified according to the following categories:
- Total number of deaths in the province, including all data from the Civil Registry and burial licenses.
- Expected number of deaths in the province according to the MoMo statistic (the system for monitoring excesses of daily mortality from all causes).
- Number of deaths due to COVID-19 disease and registered as such in the accounts carried out by the Ministry of Health.
- Number of deceased with symptoms compatible with COVID-19 but that could not be counted as victims of the disease.
As the Popular Group recalls, according to the World Health Organization, only those cases of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) supported by laboratory confirmation can be counted as positive. But, in Spain, the Sánchez government has not yet been able to provide the necessary tools for the tests to be carried out in all the required cases. As a consequence, many deaths caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus are not being accounted for correctly.
For this reason, the GPP considers it extremely probable that the number of deaths that are included in the updates published by the Ministry of Health do not coincide with the actual number of deaths caused by COVID-19. Something that the Superior Court of Justice of Castilla-La Mancha has been able to verify when comparing the data of the civil registry and burial licenses in that autonomous community with the official figures of deaths from the pandemic, and comparing both with the data from deceases of previous years.
The increase in deaths with respect to the figures that were usual in the month of March has been especially marked in certain provinces of Castilla-La Mancha and Castilla y León, in percentages much higher, even than in the Community of Madrid. This matter, which is proven in the MoMo statistics, has captured the interest of the local media and has increased the concern of citizens for the reliability of the data offered by the Government.
For the GPP, minimizing the data of fatal victims of the disease, perhaps with the purpose of cushioning citizen unrest, hinders the essential
task of developing an effective exit strategy from confinement. Furthermore, it not only generates uncertainty and discomfort among Spaniards, but it also undermines confidence in the government of the nation. Citizen fear that this discrepancy is not just a mistake but one more example of the mendacity of a government unable to foresee the severity of the pandemic – and also unable to effectively tackle it – undermines confidence in democracy itself and its institutions.
The Popular Group considers that the truth must be the first hygienic measure against the coronavirus. Having reliable and proven data is not only an unavoidable democratic requirement, it is also an essential requirement for the design of an effective confinement exit strategy.
This non-law proposal has been signed by the GPP spokeswoman, Cayetana Álvarez de Toledo, deputy for Barcelona, the PP's Deputy Social Secretary, Cuca Gamarra, deputy for La Rioja, the deputy spokespersons for the GPP, Pilar Marcos, José Ignacio Echániz and Sandra Moneo, deputies for Madrid, Guadalajara and Burgos, respectively, and for the PP deputies for Albacete, Carmen Navarro, for Soria, Tomás Cabezón, for Ciudad Real, Rosa Romero, for Segovia, Jesús Postigo, for Toledo, Carmen Riolobos, by Ávila, Alicia García, and by Zaragoza, Pedro Navarro.
