A night-time curfew returns to Sitges this Friday for at least two weeks. The tightening of restrictions by the Catalan government means that the current epidemiological data puts Sitges among the Catalan municipalities that must be confined between 1am and 6am.
Last week, the Catalan Health Department (CatSalut) had said that Sitges, along with 18 other municipalities, could come out of the curfew, having improved the epidemiological data. Yesterday [Tuesday], however, it was decided that the town and 27 other municipalities would once again fall under night-time restrictions.
The reason for the change is that the health department has tightened the criteria for considering which municipalities should be closed. Until now, those with an active Covid-19 incidence rate over 7 days below 400 could be left out of the curfew. But the new criteria lowers the incidence to 250. Sitges was yesterday [Tuesday] at 263 and therefore becomes one of the municipalities that has to close at night.
The return of night-time freedom in the early hours of last Friday morning was not exactly welcomed by the Sitges Town Council or the town’s trade associations. The fact that bars, restaurants and nightlife must still close, as in the whole of Catalonia, at half-past midnight, means that there is no economic benefit to having the curfew lifted.
On the contrary, the situation has led to crowds of young people on the beaches and breakwaters again, as was the case during June. The local Sitges police and the Mossos d’Esquadra carried out a special monitoring patrol during Friday and Saturday nights, with several agents around La Ribera and other parks in Sitges where youths often congregate. In the early hours of Saturday to Sunday, there were more than 100 young people on the beaches of La Fragata and La Ribera and the adjacent sea walls.
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