Temperature checks and screened tables the new normality at day centres for the elderly on Spain’s Costa Blanca

Day centres for the elderly in Valencia on Spain’s Costa Blanca are reopening with compulsory temperature checks three times a day and screened tables at lunch.

THIS will be the new normal at the Tres Forques and L’Amistat facilities which open on Monday, with three other centres expected to do the same in the next two weeks.

Councillor for Active Ageing, Pilar Bernabé, said capacity will initially be restricted to 33 per cent, and increase every seven days to 50 and 75 per cent before returning to normal.

She added that of the total number of people attending these centres – which runs into several hundred – around 50 per cent want to return now or from July, “so no senior will be left without a place, and besides, we’ll keep their seats for them until September.”

The councillor explained that ‘new normality’ will see measures such as groups of 10 established, who will stay together and be served and looked after by the same staff.

At lunch, instead of four per table there will be just two, and they will separated by screens.

Families will be asked to provide a ‘statement’ confirming the centre users haven’t shown symptoms of Covid-19 or been in contact with anybody who has tested positive.

Staff will be provided with personal protective equipment and users will have their temperature checked three times a day.

Excursions, parties and ‘intergenerational meetings’ have been suspended.