France is considering closing its border with Spain again. Spanish authorities yesterday banned anyone from entering or leaving the town of Totana in the southeast of the country, after 55 people who went to a local bar tested positive for COVID-19. The city, home to 32.000 people, is one of many in Spain that is shutting down again as the country struggles to trace contacts and thus come to grips with new outbreaks emerging across the country. If the border is really closed, Europeans will no longer be able to drive via France to Spain and Portugal.

People sunbathe on the beach of Barcelona during the Corona virus crisis. The city of Barcelona is facing new outbreaks of coronavirus cases with new mobility restrictions and recommendations to avoid travel outside the city. The question remains whether large cities such as Barcelona should be closed. Ada Colau, the left-wing mayor of Barcelona, ​​has warned that the government is considering introducing some restrictions on the city's residents, but says it will not return to a full shutdown like in March. 

The virus spreads quickly because of people and local hospitality failure to adhere to protocols for social distance. A club in Barcelona has been accused by regional officials of admitting more people than allowed, causing 91 people to test positive with the virus. Still, the operators claim they followed the guidelines.

contact tracking

Many experts attribute these local outbreaks to a lack of contact tracking. People who tested positive for the virus in Spain have reported that in the two weeks prior to their diagnosis, they were not asked to provide a list of people or institutions they came into contact with. Sonia Ramírez, a 21-year-old Spaniard from the northeastern region of Catalonia, said that after testing positive for the virus, she should independently warn family and friends about potential exposure. 

"They didn't ask me who I was with," Ramírez told the AP. "They didn't even ask if I had recently started working, which of course I had."

Spain was home to one of the worst COVID-19 outbreaks in Europe, with 270.166 cases and 28.429 deaths since January. The country also had the world's highest reported COVID-19 infection among doctors and nurses. But after four months in one of the strictest lockdowns on the continent, Spain lifted a state of emergency on June 21 and opened the borders for some countries.

Also read: Slovakia, of course, looks forward to opening its borders