The medical services in the Spanish enclave of Ceuta are overwhelmed and the medical staff is exhausted due to the migration crisis, President of the Ceuta Official College of Physicians, Enrique Roviralta, said.
“The services are absolutely overwhelmed. Above all, the collapse can be seen among the staff, they are broken, exhausted . Medical staff is forced to work double shifts and take more duty shifts,” Roviralta told Spanish newspaper ABC in a report published on Monday.
There is now a gastroenteritis outbreak in Ceuta, he said, adding that they even had to open an emergency wing at a hospital which had been closed since the COVID-19 pandemic.
On Sunday, EFE news agency reported that around 200 migrants who illegally entered Ceuta from Morocco staged a protest at the Spanish exclave’s Tarampolin Beach, calling on local authorities to grant them asylum. Law enforcement officers were deployed at the site.
In late July, Ceuta experienced a massive influx of migrants from neighboring Morocco. Spanish Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska estimated the number of crossings at 72,000, while Ceuta itself has a population of approximately 85,000. The sudden influx of migrants to Ceuta prompted a deployment of additional police, military and civil guard forces from mainland Spain. On August 7, Ceuta’s mayor-president Juan Jesus Vivas said about 100 migrants died in the unrest surrounding the crisis, while Spanish media put the death toll at 141. Last week, Vivas said that about 10,000 migrants were remaining in the city and claimed that Madrid was significantly downplaying this figure.