Covid and Christmas, towards the end

Published on: 12/16/2020 7:15 AM

Close the Christmas holidays at the center of the confrontation of these hours. “Now more restrictive measures are needed. We are reflecting on this in these hours. We must avoid a third wave at all costs, because it would also be devastating in terms of loss of human life,” Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said yesterday.

Since the heated meeting of the CTS, a tightening of anti-Covid measures and an increase in controls with a view to Christmas to avoid meetings that could lead to a further increase in the contagion curve was envisioned. “The rules already exist and they are those of the Dpcm of December 3,” explained the technical scientific committee, “we only modulate them in the correct way.” The experts’ concern is to ensure that scenes like those experienced last weekend in the shopping streets of the main Italian cities are not repeated. The death toll yesterday, 846 dead, would have “shocked the committee members.”

Last night the Minister of Health Roberto Speranza in the Palazzo Chigi hall had a confrontation with the Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte and this morning there will be a meeting between the government and the Regions.

During the CTS meeting “we reached an agreement on the indication of the need to tighten control measures for the pandemic,” Agostino Miozzo, coordinator of the Scientific Technical Committee, told ‘Cartabianca’. “The tightening of the rules,” he explained, “means that you have to be very careful with travel, which is one of the most characteristic determinants of the spread of the epidemic. Movements that will affect the entire country. Family members who come together but in they are actually unknown and the dramatic thing is that they come together after many months coming from different places and are potentially dangerous ”.

Miozzo specified that a new general blockade “is an indication that nobody has heard to give. We have come out of two months of restrictions that have given results, this damn curve has stopped and is falling, the indicators are favorable. But we are going through a period delicate, with conditions opposite to those necessary ”.

“It is not the doctor or the epidemiologist who decides where and when the confinement occurs. Confinement is a complex political decision,” he remarked. “If I were a politician, maybe I would feel” hired “, he added,” also because if you look at what is happening across borders, you can see that the vast majority of EU countries are moving in that direction. “

The past “was a dramatic weekend of gatherings in clubs, in the shopping streets and unfortunately these are situations for which we will pay,” said the coordinator of the Scientific Technical Committee. “I think we will have to make the decision to close ranks, also because we are projecting ourselves towards January 7, which is an important date because children must go back to school.”

“I think it is useful and necessary to restrict even more during the holidays. This is the position that leaves the CTS, it will also leave the Regions and also the Municipalities ask us,” said the Minister of Regional Affairs, Francesco Boccia, guest of ‘Say Tuesday’. I think it is also very responsible on our part to be consistent. In May we had reached 0.5 of the contagion index, Rt, but with June, July and August ahead. Now, thanks to the measures already taken, we are going down that path, but we are facing January. , February and March and we must be responsible – he warned – We must know that as of January 7 we will start again, but we will start again ensuring the health networks as much as possible. If we don’t do it during the Christmas holidays, when should we do it … “.

“At this moment – Boccia stressed – the decision he is waiting for refers to three days, that is, December 25, 26 and 31 than the rest of the period, which is already subject to very clear prescriptions. I think that from the days before the holidays until January 6-7 it is more useful to close for everyone. We want to close as much as possible. My position and that of Esperanza are known, we want to share them with the Regions ”.

“If the question is: is there a Christmas dinner? My answer is no. Taking on meetings is crazy. Assuming dinners that are not convivial is wrong. We have a duty to save lives. We will have dinners next year. “said the Minister of Regional Affairs.

Gianni Rezza, general director of Prevention of the Ministry of Health, during the press conference on the analysis of the epidemiological situation of Covid-19 in Italy explained that “the Regions that had” higher incidences of Covid-19 “were subjected to the measures more restrictive, according to the numbers, they are better than others. The Italian situation clearly shows a mechanism: when we relax the measures, the cases go up, when we restrict them we achieve results in terms of reduction of positives in a few weeks and cases “.

Basically, Rezza noted, “where we had very high incidences and the red zone measures were taken before and after a certain parking lot in the orange zone, these interventions worked a lot. Let’s see instead that the Regions that were in the yellow zone increase the incidence of infections. While those who have been in the red zone and then orange are with even lower numbers. The search for a balance is not always easy to obtain, but it is important to seek this balance between measures, incidence and the consequences that are obtained Unfortunately, the number of new admissions to intensive care and deaths is still very high. We are above the critical threshold for occupancy of beds in intensive care and above the critical threshold for occupation of places in the medical area ” , he concluded.