- The Spanish Minister of Transport, José Luis Ábalos, said that the state of emergency would have to be extended later. He pointed out that lengthening the situation may lead to measures being tightened up, but he pointed out that the need for further action depends on the case society makes of the measures now implemented.
“We will obviously have to extend this situation, we will see how, but I do not think we can win this battle in 15 days,” said the minister at RNE, as stated in the eldiario.es. For his part, Minister of the Interior, Grande-Marlaska, said that closing borders is a "real possibility" that will be resolved throughout the morning.
Although there is still no clear date for the end of the epidemic, the Government of the Community of Madrid has said that it believes that on 15 April there will be more patients than daytime patients. The Minister of Health of this Government, Enrique Ruiz Escudero, explained that on 25 March the number of positives will begin to drop.
Criticism of Catalonia
The ministers of the state of alarm in Spain on 15 and 16 March have strongly criticised the attitude of the Catalan President, Quim Torra. Torra has stated that he considers that the state of alarm "invades competences", since it confers on the Spanish Government the competence of the entire state.
Defense Minister Margarita Robles criticized this attitude on the grounds that the coronavirus is not a political issue and that someone with this attitude should be “out of public life”. The same thing has been done by the Transport Minister, Ábalos, who has called for political projects to be "put aside".