Coronavirus, Italy becomes a “protected area”: movements prohibited if not for proven needs.

by Expats living in Rome

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Coronavirus, Italy becomes a “protected area”: movements prohibited if not for proven needs. PM Conte: “There is no more time, tough measures are needed”. Schools closed until April 3, stop for Serie A championships, premises closed at 6pm.

ROME – “All of Italy will be a protected area”. No more red, green or yellow area. All movements are prohibited except for proven needs, throughout Italy as up to now in Lombardy and in the 14 provinces. This was announced by Prime Minister Conte at a press conference at Palazzo Chigi.

The premier comes to the press room alone for what is undoubtedly the most dramatic announcement of his government experience: “We have adopted a new decision based on an assumption: there is no time”, he says. “The numbers tell us that we are having an important growth of the infections, of the people hospitalized in intensive and sub-intensive care and alas also of the deceased people. Our habits therefore must be changed. They must be changed now. I decided to take even more stringent measures immediately, stronger. ” The measure is the one expected and now considered inevitable: “I am about to sign a measure that we can summarize as ‘I stay at home’. There will no longer be a red area on the peninsula. Italy will be a protected area”, he adds.

“Movements prohibited except for proven needs”
As already today in Lombardy and in the 14 northern provinces, the movement of people is prohibited except for proven reasons of health, necessity or work. “I am fully aware of the seriousness and responsibility,” explains Conte. “We can’t afford to let our guard down. It’s time for responsibility and we all have it.

You citizens are all with me. The right decision today is to stay home. Our future is in our hands, “he adds.

“There is no limitation on public transport on the agenda, to ensure the continuity of the production system and allow people to go to work,” said the premier. It will be possible to “self-certify” to justify the movements”, he specifies.

 

The new measures, which will be in the Official Gazette tonight and will become operational from tomorrow morning, and of which the premier informed the Quirinale and the oppositions, also concern schools and sporting events: throughout Italy the institutes will remain closed until April 3. The sporting events will not continue, so the Serie A championship also stops. “Let’s also add the ban on gatherings outdoors and in places open to the public,” said the Prime Minister. Throughout Italy, bars and restaurants will close at 6pm.

 

Lombardy – center of contagion, Rome is observed specially

As for ICU patients, Borrelli specified, there are 733, 83 more than yesterday. Of these 440 are in Lombardy, which had an increase in 41 cases in one day. There are instead 4,316 patients with hospitalized symptoms and 2,936 those in home isolation. “Today the connection with the regions continued for the necessary equipment, and we have started delivering 325 respiratory fans for intensive and subintensive therapy, the distribution starts with Lombardy”, added Borrelli. “The average age of ICU patients, hospitalized in critical conditions, is very high in Italy”, observed the head of the infectious diseases department of the ISS, Gianni Rezza. There are 463 Italian victims of the coronavirus. “If we stratify the lethality rates by age” in Italy “we see that they are lower than those of China. It is possible then that, since symptomatic people are being buffered – adds the expert – the denominator is reduced to people with symptoms or hospitalized, and therefore the lethality rate of the disease seems higher than it is “.

 

Asked about the situation in Rome, Rezza, who said that in the capital the “virus is starting to circulate”, replied: “Rome was a pre-emptive alarm. We found ourselves with a completely unexpected situation in Codogno, dramatic, but then it was not known that the virus was circulating. If we now see even a small increase in a location far from the red zone, it is right to pay attention immediately so as not to find ourselves in difficulty afterwards. We prevent rather than intervene later “, in the capital as in the rest of Italy.

 

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