At dinner with a “positive” for days waiting for ASL communications

CELLINO SAN MARCO – Closed at home since last Monday in “self-quarantine” after attending a dinner where one of the diners tested positive for Covid. Waiting for ASL communications on how to behave and when to swab. No one, apart from the person who tested positive, communicated anything to him. And the numbers indicated for the Coronavirus emergency are always “busy”. The protagonist of this story is a 26-year-old from Cellino San Marco, an aeronautical installer at a company in the Tarantino area.

“Last Sunday I had dinner with a group of friends and girlfriends. On Monday one of them told me that she tested positive for Covid and that she had provided my information with the ASL phone number as part of the epidemiological investigation that began after her positivity. We are on Thursday and no one has called me. The other diners were contacted by ASL. I don’t and I don’t know how to behave ”.

The young man has locked himself at home and has not gone to work but is “unjustifiably” absent. He has no symptoms attributable to covid, but common sense and past experiences with the health emergency have led him to be cautious. Remain isolated to avoid any contagion in case of having contracted the covid.

“I immediately locked myself at home waiting for information on how to behave. I know someone should contact me to tell me the date on the tampon or tell me what to do, but to date no one has called me. I called the numbers in charge and they are always busy, the automatic voice answers and tells me to try again. I made the report through the GP and the occupational doctor, but no one told me what to do. I live with my parents and I don’t know how I should behave with them either. It is clear that I am prudent but I have no information about it ”.

A situation that for the 26-year-old from Cellino is surreal, he also asked the carabinieri for clarification. “I called the ASL switchboard in Brindisi to find out how to do it, if there were other numbers to call that I don’t know, they told me that no one would ever answer those numbers related to the health emergency. They proposed to lock me in the house and wait and not worry about the work that would be solved with a certificate. So I got in contact with the police and they obviously couldn’t give me information either because they are not competent to handle these situations. They suggested that I write to the mayor ”.

“I wonder what the point is to leave your details in restaurants if later nobody contacts people who may have been infected. If my friend had not informed me, ASL would never have called me to tell me that I had been in contact with a positive one. Is this how this health emergency is handled, which from what they tell us is very serious? For me this lack of information is not normal. Do I have to stay home until symptoms appear? Should I lock myself in a room? ”Questions that the 26-year-old does not know who to ask.