Madrid, Jul 16 (IANS): A monthly opinion poll published by the Spanish Center of Sociological Investigations (CIS) showed a slight rise in the support for the Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez-led government amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

The CIS poll, which was conducted on July 1-9, revealed on Wednesday that if a general election was held now in Spain, Sanchez's Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE) would obtain 32.1 per cent of the vote, 0.9 percentage point up from June and more than the 28 per cent the party won in the November 2019 vote, reports Xinhua news agency.

The backing for the People's Party (PP) has also risen to 21.2 per cent, which is 0.4 percentage point up from November 2019.

Meanwhile, the far-right Vox party has seen its support slide 3.5 percentage points since the election to 11.6 per cent.

The support for left-wing Unidas Podemos climbed 0.7 percentage point in a month to 12.1 per cent.

The backing for the centre-right Ciudadanos was 8.8 per cent, two points better than its performance at the general election.

The survey looked at other issues, such as the pandemic, with 62.3 per cent saying they believed the government should be continuing with more restrictive measures to prevent a second wave of COVID-19 and 44.7 per cent admitting they are still worried about the health crisis.

A total of 88.9 per cent of the respondents said they wanted to see reforms in the public health service after the crisis, with increased spending and more staff in both hospitals and local health centres.

Spain, which was one of the worst-hit countries in Europe, has so far recorded a total of 257,494 COVID-19 cases, with 28,413 deaths.