In the Association of Economic Kitchens Rainha Santa Isabel (ACERSI), Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa distributed greetings with his elbows but also meals to needy people who travel every day to that social space in downtown Coimbra.

With the economic and social crisis that is taking place, the number of people who go there has increased and the President of the Republic, speaking to journalists, made a point of alerting the indirect victims of this pandemic.

"What is a fact is that, looking at the queues that passed here, and the same in Porto and Lisbon, we find, in addition to the old homeless people, a lot of people, Portuguese and foreigners, who are the new homeless" noted Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa.

According to the head of state, the big difference is the increase in "very young people" who resort to this support, having found precarious workers as well as students.

"They were middle class and, suddenly, because of the crisis, they were thrown into a homeless situation with no roof or roof but no money," he said.

ACERSI's technical director, Ana Maria Cristóvão, explained to journalists that there has been an increase of 200 people who are being supported by the institution since the beginning of the pandemic, now providing support to a total of around 550 people, with more than 800 meals daily.

"Because of the care we provide, the people we follow and forward, I do not think that this crisis can be solved with the speed with which it was installed," he said, saying that some of those who resort to ACERSI lost their jobs, others took it back and others resumed it but ended up losing it.

Ana Maria Cristóvão pointed out that the institution has several cases of people who, without a job and without a family support network, started to have many difficulties in "being able to pay for indispensable things".

"I don't have much hope that everything will go well," she admitted.