From the ‘Covid-free holidays’ to the orange zone: in Puglia the Region’s delays weighed on tampons and beds

Puglia woke up orange. Look around and do not understand. Not by the surprise of being discovered in high-risk areas, this has been known for a long time. And it is not even because of the school’s mess, with constant changes in decisions about open or closed schools that in 24 hours have given parents and teachers headaches, confusing children and adolescents. Apulia looks around and understands little because it is surrounded by other regions that until a few weeks ago worsened – or at least that was what was understood even looking at what happened with the harsh street demonstrations – and that are tinted yellow, therefore with fewer restrictions than those that the Apulianos will have to respect from tomorrow.

Questions and answers: orange zone of Puglia, this is what you can not do

by Cenzio Di Zanni

November 04, 2020

This is the case in Campania, but also in Liguria, Veneto and Emilia Romagna, with a higher number of cases and hospitalizations than in Puglia and an Rt index, which calculates the acceleration of contagion, as high as that of Puglia, if not plus. The criteria on which the elections of the Ministry of Health are based are objective, they are based on the 21 indicators identified by the Scientific Technical Committee to constantly monitor the risk to the health of the regions that are fighting the pandemic. Among these 21 indicators is not only the Rt index, but also the number of accesses to the emergency room, the occupation of beds (especially in intensive care), the percentage of positives in the cases analyzed, the number of outbreaks and cases tested, all days, as well as RSA tracking. Data that the same Regions provide to the Ministry of Health to draw conclusions.

Puglia in the orange zone, what changes. Movements to other municipalities or regions only for work or health reasons

November 04, 2020

And so, based on the data collected in the week between October 19 and 25 (the one from which the data was drawn), Puglia was classified in a type 3 scenario and a “high” risk area. For this reason, it has been included, together with Sicily, in the orange zone, with all the great restrictions that this entails. So that week Puglia was much worse than Campania, Emilia, Veneto, Liguria and Lazio, to name the regions where there are more cases and hospitalizations. Impossible to understand the reasons for this classification at this time.

At this point, it must be assumed that Puglia has paid for its delays in the installation of beds dedicated to Covid, just at the moment when the second wave gave its greatest acceleration. In fact, even now the beds dedicated to the emergency are all occupied, especially in the areas of Foggia, Bat and Bari (the situation is less heavy in Salento). Puglia probably also pays for the low number of tampons made, 5,000 per day against 15,000 in Campania which perhaps not surprisingly ended up in the yellow zone by surprise. However, it is true that this classification is destined to change very soon, since in the next few hours the Higher Institute of Health will have available the data of the last days of the regions. Regions like Veneto, Liguria, and Campania itself will most likely end up in the orange zone as well. We will see.