MADRID — Spain’s health minister says the government won’t extend the state of emergency in the Madrid region when it expires on Saturday but may introduce curfews at coronavirus hotspots around the country.

Health Minister Salvador Illa says the partial lockdown in the Madrid area in recent weeks had helped limit community transmission that made it one of Europe’s most significant coronavirus clusters.

However, he noted Madrid’s number of cases is still high. The region has reported more than 29,000 cases in the past two weeks. It's tally on Tuesday was 354 new cases in 24 hours — Spain’s fourth-highest rate.

Illa says he’s conferring with Spain’s regional governments about targeted curfews as the country approaches the milestone of 1 million officially recorded cases.

“I want to be very clear,” Illa says. “Some very hard weeks are coming.”