Italy announced Saturday, February 22, the isolation for about two weeks of a dozen northern cities, after the discovery of nearly 80 cases of contamination with the new coronavirus, and two deaths.
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" In areas considered to be homes, neither entry nor exit will be allowed unless there is a special exemption ," Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte told reporters before the press, saying that around 50,000 people will be affected. However, people will be able to move inside these isolated areas. If necessary to monitor the checkpoints, the Prime Minister said he would send the army. The legislative decree provides for sanctions of up to three months' imprisonment.
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At the end of an extraordinary council of ministers lasting more than four hours and at the end of a day of all-out meetings, Conte also announced the closure of businesses and educational establishments in these areas as well as the cancellation of events public (carnivals, sports competitions, school trips, etc.). Three Serie A championship games scheduled for Sunday have been postponed: Inter-Sampdoria, Atalanta-Sassuolo and Verona-Cagliari. They were to take place in the two most affected regions: Lombardy (around Milan) and Veneto (around Venice). The universities of these two major regions will be closed as a precaution.
Information signs in the streets of Codogno call on the population to stay at home. MIGUEL MEDINA / AFP
The main focus is in Codogno, 60 km south of Milan. In this city and nine neighboring localities, all public places (bars, town halls, libraries, schools) except pharmacies have been closed since Friday evening. The other area is the village of Vo 'Euganeo where the first death of an Italian (and European), a 78-year-old mason named Adriano Trevisan, was announced on Friday evening. The second death of a woman of the same age occurred near Codogno.
The trains of the private company Trenord no longer stop at the stations of Codogno and two neighboring cities, inhabited by many people working in the metropolis of Milan, the Italian economic capital. MIGUEL MEDINA / AFP
Mystery
The head of civil protection, Angelo Borelli, has announced a total of 79 patients to date, in which he has included three contaminations known for weeks, contracted outside Italy. Of the total of people tested positive, 13 are in intensive therapy, 33 hospitalized with symptoms and 11 simply in isolation at home.
According to the Lombardy authorities, the focus of this region originates from Mattia, a 38-year-old researcher, " patient 1 ", hospitalized in intensive care since Wednesday in Codogno and transferred Saturday to Pavia. His illness is a mystery because it is excluded that he was infected by one of his friends who returned from China in January. " Based on the tests performed, (the friend) did not develop the antibodies, " said Deputy Minister of Health Pierpaolo Sileri.
New measures to contain the epidemic are expected, including the quarantine of people deemed at risk.
In the streets of Codogno. MIGUEL MEDINA / AFP
worries
Appeared in December in Wuhan, China, the coronavirus has spread to more than 25 countries and is causing growing concern due to new outbreaks in Europe and the Middle East. More than 2,400 people have died in China, for about 77,000 cases of contamination.
A sudden acceleration of contaminations outside China has appeared, in particular in Italy therefore, but also in South Korea, and in Iran where it has already caused five deaths, ie the highest number of deaths recorded in a country outside the Far East . The World Health Organization (WHO) is concerned about the speed at which the virus has spread in Iran and the risks for other countries like Lebanon. WHO also fears " the potential for dissemination of Covid-19 in countries with more precarious health systems ," warned its director general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. This is the case of many African countries whose health infrastructures and medical personnel are ill-prepared to face the epidemic. For the moment, on the continent, only Egypt has recorded a confirmed case of contamination.