(ANSA) - ROME, DEC 03 - Covid has accentuated the gaps in society, increasing vulnerability but also incredulity. So èboom della poverty - in 2020 2 million Italian families live in absolute poverty, with a significant increase (+ 104.8%) compared to 2010 (980,000) - but still many believe that Covid does not exist. The 55th Censis Report notes this.
The increase in poverty is especially sustained in the North (+ 131.4%; + 67.6% in the Center and + 93.8% in the South). Of the families that fell into absolute poverty during the first year of the pandemic, 65% reside in the North (21% in the South, 14% in the Center). The report also highlights how the pandemic has accentuated the sense of vulnerability: 40.3% of Italians feel insecure thinking about health and the future need to have recourse to health services.
The report also highlights that "the irrational has infiltrated the social fabric. For 5.9% of Italians (about 3 million) Covid does not exist, for 10.9% the vaccine is useless. And then: 5.8 % are convinced that the Earth is flat, for 10% man has never landed on the Moon, for 19.9% 5G is a sophisticated tool to control people ". "Alongside the reasonable and wise majority, a wave of irrationality rises", we observe in the report, which reads "the spy of something deeper: the subjective expectations betrayed cause the flight into magical thought".
On young students "from a psychological point of view, the prolonged period of the pandemic has caused not indifferent side effects", the report continues.
"81.0% of the 572 secondary school heads of secondary school interviewed report that forms of depression and existential distress are increasingly widespread among students".
In its general considerations, the report highlights that "Italian society has changed and has gone through crises and emergencies with continuous intertwining. Also in light of the changes posed by the pandemic," it is time for a serious schedule ", for" structural reforms "and" for public intervention "with" courageous choices ". (ANSA).