15 days before the closure in Lombardy

“Let’s see in ten or fifteen days”: in the vagueness with which the Mayor of Milan Beppe Sala responds to the question about the risk of a confinement in Milan, there is all the anxiety of the institutions that see an increasingly aggravated situation in all of Lombardy but they can’t find the right weapons to stop the infection. That is why the hypothesis of the red zone in the capital is becoming more and more concrete while the rest of the territory begins to shake.

“Milan red zone”

Let’s go in order. Yesterday the messenger wrote that Attilio Fontana was preparing to declare the total closure of Lombardy with a provision to be signed within two days. Pirellone has flatly denied the hypothesis but, meanwhile, Guido Bertolino, who is responsible for coordinating Lombard’s first aid, has also called for closure, claiming that the situation is now on the brink of collapse. That is why there are those who ask for the red zone, which is an isolated area where the free movement of people is prohibited, entrances and exits are blocked and there is an “active surveillance” system.

The first red areas established by the government for the Covid emergency after February 21 were Vo ‘Euganeo, Codogno and the municipalities of Lower Lodigiano. On March 8 it was the turn of Lombardy and the provinces of Parma, Piacenza, Rimini, ReggioEmilia, Modena, Pesaro and Urbino, Venice, Padua, Treviso, Alessandria, Verbano-Cusio-Ossola, Novara, Vercelli and Asti. And today, in an interview with Corriere della Sera, Sala says that today “there are 80 patients intubated in Milan and 201 in Lombardy” while “in April they were between 1,500 and 1,700” (but only on Monday there were 271 hospitalized in intensive care, and in a single day in Milan 44 of them admitted): “The conclusion is that, even in the worst case, we would have between 10 and 15 days to decide the confinement. Of course, today our doctors and our nurses are dealing with a huge mass of hospitalizations and in Milan we only have 13 Usca. However, I believe that it is not yet an unsolvable problem. ”

Republic Write today that the pressure to intervene, however, increases as the hours go by. Gianni Rezza, general director of Prevention of the Ministry of Health says clearly: “The mini-closures of individual areas are an option to consider, almost an automatism”. And Conte confirms it, “it is a way that the dpcm makes possible”.

Towards a new Dpcm in November for the closure in Italy?

15 days before the closure in Lombardy

But if, in the meantime, 26,000 infections are expected today (22,000 were yesterday) in the Civil Protection bulletin, on the other hand Walter Ricciardi, a consultant to Minister Speranza but a “free attacker” with regard to executive policy, is not afraid to say. that in Milan, as in Naples, people are infected in the bar or on the bus: “There are areas of the country where transmission is exponential and the latest restrictions adopted that may be effective in the rest of the territory, are not valid in those areas to stop the infection in Milan and Naples one can catch Covid-19 by entering the bar, restaurant, taking the bus. Being in close contact with a positive is very easy because the virus circulates a lot. In these areas the confinement is necessary, in other areas of the country not ”.

For this reason, the current Dpcm may not be enough: “The circulation of the virus in metropolitan areas is so high that today it is not possible to allow demonstrations and events in closed environments such as cinemas and theaters, even if the protocols are respected.” While Massimo Galli says today in an interview with The impression that “we are making a more than fair bet and in ten days we will know if we have won or lost it.” Ten, fifteen days before the closure.