Changes

This chapter focuses on some aspects that are present on a territory prior to the arrival of a disease and may favour or hinder the diffusion of the pandemic once the disease starts spreading, e.g. household overcrowding, healthy life years, age structure of the population, total amount of inhabitants per human settlement or the different types of human settlements. Population and human settlements are studied first in this chapter, whilst the text delves afterwards into a double-page devoted to comorbidities.

There were 47,450,795 inhabitants in Spain as of 1 January 2020. This means an average population density of 93.6 inhabitants/km2. It is the fourth State within the European Union in terms of total population and ranks seventeenth in terms of population density. The spatial distribution of the population in Spain shows at first glance a sharp contrast between a denser periphery –together with the islands– and a more empty hinterland –with the only exceptions of Madrid, Saragossa (Zaragoza) and Valladolid– (see the map on Total population and population density).

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