Italy to surpass 700,000 dead this year, worst figure since WWII

The certain risk that control of the coronavirus epidemic in Italy will be lost again in January, when a third wave could arrive which will mix with the last movements of the second phase and the start of the massive vaccination plan, divided this Wednesday by within the government and the twenty governors in a long conclave to decide whether or not to put the Christmas, New Year’s and Kings holidays in rigid quarantine.

Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte does not want to strictly set up 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 past two days, 1,526 people have died, bringing the total to 66,527, the highest in Europe.

At the end of this year, deaths from all causes in Italy will be more than 700,000, a figure not reached since 1944, which was the bloodiest year for Italians in the final stages of WWII.

“The pace of the epidemic is impressive,” admitted Gianni Rezza, one of the right hands of the Minister of Health, Roberto Speranza. Conte maintains that there are positive signs: less infected, less sick in intensive and subintensive therapy. Agree to act, but at a less rigid level. Leave businesses open, but close bars and restaurants.

But in front of him is a motley wall. Minister Speranza and other members of the cabinet they want extreme rigor Because only a rigid quarantine, which would shut down all businesses, prevent people from leaving their homes if not to make purchases, would not allow parties with an accumulation of relatives, a great source of contagion.

However, the immobilized parts would have a high popularity cost, with protests from the sectors concerned.

There is no other way to resolve 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 brutal quarantine. Tuesday, in Veneto, 165 dead for the first time. “If the national government does not want to apply a national red zone, we will carry out a total quarantine in Veneto,” Zaia said. Other governors have accepted.

Nearly 70,000 dead

The data is astounding. In the first seven months of the pandemic, the so-called first wave, 35,000 people died. By the end of this month, the figure will double, it will be 70 thousand added in half as much in October, November and December.

The prospect of a third wave which denotes 100,000 deaths is directly an unbearable nightmare. There is no room for half measures, the war on the coronavirus demands heroic measures which come at a very high price for productive activities.

An example that these days helps to lower Italians more has come and population statistics. This year the death toll in Italy will be more than 700,000, the highest number since the end of World War II, when the country was partly made of rubble by the invasion of the southern allies to which the fierce defense faced. German troops, the bloody struggle of the partisans of the resistance against the fascists, the Nazi-fascist repression of the civilian population, the incessant bombardments of towns. The comparison hurts a lot.

“We need two weeks of strong quarantine to put the country in safe conditions,” said Health Minister Roberto Speranza.

Vaccine expectations

Hopes are focused on vaccines. Next Monday, the EMA, the European drug body, will give authorization to the 27 European countries which will put on a continental show after Christmas.

All together, on the same day, at a ceremony in which many celebrities will put their arms to the vaccination shot to encourage people. Because there are so many who are wary of the quality of the doses, even if in the United States and Great Britain there are already thousands who have received Pfizer vaccines.

Nearly two million doses are about to arrive in Italy from Belgium, brought special trucks from a factory in the North American laboratory.

It is estimated that in seven or eight months, the mass vaccination which will begin next month will be close to achieving the goal of so-called “herd immunity” of having put 70 % of Italians safe, 42 million of the total of 60 million inhabitants.

The vaccination campaign will mobilize the country. In the main squares all over Italy there will be special flower-shaped constructions that will serve as health centers. It will be about two thousand. But the areas of hospitals and health centers will also work.

The issue of vaccination, in any case, will be another story, as we must first overcome the dilemmas of the impending holiday season and a dreaded and expected third attack of the coronavirus that will cost thousands more deaths.

Rome, correspondent

CB