Spain cancels Pamplona bull-run for the second year in row over COVID-19 surge

Pamplona’s celebrated bull run, which has been a popular attraction not only in Spain but internationally, has been cancelled, in the wake of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. The announcement was made by the city’s Mayor, who confirmed that the festival has been nixed for the second year in a row. Officially a part of the Spanish San Fermin festival, the bull run event hosts over a million people every year in normal conditions.

"It is with regret that I am forced to officially cancel the San Fermin festival for this year 2021", Enrique Maya told a news conference.

'Very high risk' 

He further asserted that holding the festival in the northern city would be “very high risk” owing to the low vaccination rate in Pamplona. The festival in honour of the patron saint of Spain’s northern Navarre region — San Fermín — dates back to medieval times and involves religious processions, concerts and all-night partying in addition to the bull runs that have made it famous.

As of April 26, the cases in the Navarre region, the capital of which is Pamplona is nearing 59 thousand, marking one of the highest rates of infection in Spain. Meanwhile, the nationwide cases of coronavirus climbed to 3,468,617, out of whom 77,591 have died. Spain's government is optimistically sticking to its pledge to vaccinate 70% of its adult population by the end of the summer despite the latest setback to Europe's vaccinations effort. According to Associated Press, the country was expecting to receive 300,000 doses of Janssen last week but Johnson & Johnson has delayed delivery of its vaccine to European countries following the decision by the US Food and Drug Administration to pause the shots for possible links to very rare blood clots.

The condition in Spain is so troublesome that a 40-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of assault after allegedly infecting 22 people with coronavirus. The man who has not been named by the police as yet has been reported to have gone to his office and gym despite having a temperature of over 40C or 104F. According to a BBC report, the man had been exhibiting COVID-19 symptoms for a number of days. 

Image Credits: AP