Julio Algañaraz
12/16/2020 2:45 PM
Clarín.com
World
Updated 12/16/2020 2:45 PM
The certain risk that control of the coronavirus epidemic in Italy will be lost again in January, when a third wave may arrive that will be mixed with the latest movements of the second phase and the beginning of the massive vaccination plan, divided this Wednesday by inside the government and the twenty governors in a long conclave to decide whether or not to put the Christmas, New Year and Kings holidays in rigid quarantine.
Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte does not want to strictly implement a "red zone" from Thursday 24 to 7 January, which would close everything and immobilize the country to reduce infections and especially deaths.
In the last two days 1,526 people died, bringing the total to 66,527 deaths, the highest in Europe.
By the end of this year,
the deaths from all causes in Italy will be more than 700,000, a number never reached since 1944,
which was the bloodiest year for Italians in the final phase of World War II.
"The pace of the epidemic is impressive," acknowledged Gianni Rezza, one of the right hands of the Minister of Health, Roberto Speranza.
Conte argues that there are positive signs: less infected, less sick in intensive and subintensive therapy.
He agrees to take action, but on a less rigid level
.
Leave businesses open, but do close bars and restaurants.
But in front of it is a motley wall.
Minister Speranza and other members of the cabinet
want extreme rigor
because only a rigid quarantine, which would close all businesses, would prevent people from leaving home if it is not to make purchases, it would not allow parties with accumulation of relatives, a great source of contagions.
However, the immobilized parties would have a strong popularity cost, with protests from the affected sectors.
There is no other way to solve the dilemma.
Luca Zaia, the right-wing governor of Veneto, agrees with members of the PD, the main government party, that there is no other option but to force a rough quarantine.
On Tuesday in Veneto there were 165 deaths for the first time.
"If the national government does not want to apply a national red zone, we will do a total quarantine in Veneto," Zaia said. Other governors agreed.
A woman prepares to take a coronavirus test at an armed post in a square in Rome, this Wednesday.
Photo: EFE
Almost 70,000 dead
The data is staggering.
In the first seven months of the pandemic, the so-called first wave, 35 thousand people died.
By the end of this month the figure will double, it will be 70 thousand added in half the time in October, November and December.
The prospect of a third wave that points to 100,000 deaths is directly an unbearable nightmare.
There is no room for half measures, the war against the coronavirus demands heroic measures that have a very high price for productive activities.
An example that helps to lower Italians more these days came in demographic statistics.
This year the death toll in Italy will be more than 700 thousand, the highest number since the end of World War II, when the country was partly made of rubble by the invasion of the allies from the south that was faced by the fierce defense of the German troops, the bloody struggle of the resistance partisans against the fascists, the Nazi-fascists' repression of the civilian population, the relentless bombardments of the cities.
The comparison hurts a lot.
"We need two weeks of strong quarantine to put the country in a safe condition," said Health Minister Roberto Speranza.
A closed place in front of the emblematic Piazza Navona, in Rome.
A new strict quarantine would have severe financial consequences.
Photo: EFE
Expectations in vaccines
Hopes are focused on vaccines.
Next Monday the EMA, the European drug body, will give authorization for the 27 European countries that will do a continental show after Christmas.
All together, on the same day, in a ceremony in which many celebrities will put their arms to the vaccination prick to encourage people.
Because there are so many who distrust the quality of the doses, although in the United States and Great Britain there are already thousands who have received Pfizer vaccines.
Almost two million doses are about to arrive in Italy
from Belgium, brought in special trucks from a factory in the North American laboratory.
It is estimated that in seven or eight months the mass vaccination that will begin next month will be close to reaching the goal of achieving the so-called “herd immunity”, that is, having put 70% of Italians in safety, 42 million of the total of 60 million inhabitants.
The vaccination campaign will mobilize the country.
In the main squares throughout Italy there will be special flower-shaped constructions that will serve as health centers.
It will be about two thousand.
But areas of hospitals and health centers will also work.
Vaccination, however, will be another story, because first it is necessary to overcome the dilemmas of the imminent end of the year parties and a feared and expected third attack of the coronavirus that will cost another thousands of deaths.
Rome, correspondent
CB
Look also
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