[ad_1]
Councilor Giulio Gallera, the mayor of Milan, Beppe Sala, says he does not feel protected by her as a citizen.
It is chilling that the mayor and deputy mayor of Milan are asking to vaccinate healthy municipal employees first over the elderly, cancer patients and pregnant women and do so with obvious interest in next year’s election campaign. Sala seems to me to have an obvious oxygen debt for next year.
The controversy arises from the email sent by the Lombardy Region to the Milan City Council to communicate that vaccine doses will not be available for conventions of extra fragile categories, in this case for thousands of employees as requested by the administration. Already yesterday the Deputy Mayor Scavuzzo had attacked Gallera, who dismissed the protest as an “instrumental controversy.”
Why is it an instrumental controversy?
The Regions buy the vaccines and are obliged to deliver them to the weaker categories, certainly not to resell them. When they progress, as happens every year, we make them available to citizens who do not fall within the target groups. But this year with increasing applications and expanding target groups, the priority is for the latter. The behavior of those who probably understood that the Milanese understood that the king is naked is sad. Sala will be judged by the Milanese for what he did or did not do during the emergency and at the administrative level in his five years as mayor.
In the days of the emergency, he made it clear that he was available to run for mayor. Are you still or have you changed your mind?
The availability you speak of did not exist then or now.
This is a concept that Giulio Gallera will return to often during the interview. The regional councilor for Well-being of the Lombardy Region, with “its” governor, Attilio Fontana, protagonist of the health emergency that shocked Lombardy from February to April, insists on the “institutional harmony” between the Government and the Regions, which is declining on availability, if necessary, to welcome patients from the south to be admitted to intensive care in Lombardy.
Today Professor Remuzzi, speaking of Lombardy, declares that “the virus circulates much less and with different effects.” Words of encouragement, councilor?
We are comforted, we have been able to face the emergency. Beyond those who make controversy, we keep our guard very high. We cannot afford to lower it.
But in Lombardy infections and deaths continue to grow – yesterday 393 new positives and 5 deaths – and Lombardy ranks second among the regions with the highest increase in new cases. You are worried?
We are always vigilant, but the numbers show that Lombardy is in the last places in terms of contagion. In Lazio, which has half of our inhabitants, there are 711 hospitalized, in Campania 434. We have 293. There is no ongoing competition, but it is an objective fact. We are in better shape.
So you’re not worried?
Prudence and attention are still the watchwords. We are doing a great job of tracking down the positives, especially the asymptomatic ones. In February we were taken by surprise, we had no tools. We stopped the tsunami with our hands and quickly put in place a monitoring system that works even now. With an average of 20,000 tampons a day, we are the region that does it the most.
Thinking of getting more ICU jobs?
The growth, albeit slow, of intensive care admissions worries everyone. In the months of crisis, we reached 1,808 places in intensive care, an increase of 130 percent. We have a plan to expand the positions in intensive care shared with the Government, the emergency commissioner has not yet identified the companies that need to do the work, but we will achieve it.
Will the Hospital de la Feria be useful?
We hope not. But after the 150 intensive care posts located in the 17 hubs, the opening of the fair’s two hospitals, Milan and Bergamo, is triggered.
You have reopened the Covid hospitals, how are you organizing yourself?
From the beginning we identified these hospitals that had the specialties to admit patients who were and are in our region. Today there are 39 patients in intensive care, two less than yesterday.
Masks and personal protective equipment, which were missing in the days of the great emergency, do they exist today?
Yes, we have our reserves in stock. We can cope with the situation.
Also in the RSA?
Now infected patients are transferred, they no longer remain in the facilities, where the virus arrived in December. There is a close relationship with the RSA.
Individual behavior and compliance with anti-contagion rules in this phase are decisive. Do you see more attention than in the recent past?
Yes, almost everyone wears masks, it seems to me that there is more responsibility. The theme of young people and nightlife spots remains, but respect for the rules has entered everyday life.
Progress is being made towards the obligation of the outdoor mask in the national territory, a tightening of the controls and a kind of coverage against fires are evaluated with an intervention in the hours of the premises. Will they be necessary or should it have been done earlier?
A balance must be found between financial and health needs. In this, respect for the rules becomes a central element. Because there is an important social problem. We must send a message to those who are concerned about the future.
You are welcome.
With a great regional health action, with increasingly efficient systems and complying with regulations, we will be able to live with the virus.
Immediately after the emergency, specifying that he does not want to make a controversy, he highlighted some of the deficiencies of the government towards Lombardy. How are relations today with Minister Speranza?
Excellent, Speranza has always been a rational and concrete reference, she has always been close to us. What we expect from everyone is respect for our region, that we objectively evaluate the situation it is in and that we do not forget that those who had to provide us with tools did not.
You mean the government?
I don’t want to blame the government, the crisis has surprised and overwhelmed everyone. We respect the difficulties of others as long as ours are recognized and respected. At one point, an unexpected attack was launched towards Lombardy that pained me as an Italian, about which I would like to say something.
What?
I hope that we are returning to a system of institutional harmony that is lacking in the mayor of Milan but it is important to encourage those who really have the power to decide. So, first of all, the Government and the Regions, today at the forefront from North to South.
By the way, are you worried about the growth of infections in the south?
It is a problem for everyone. In the last few months on the part of some regional exponents but also of the newspapers of the South there was an almost sadistic complacency for what was happening in Lombardy. But there is no war of the North against the South, so we do not respond. With most of the governors of the South, the relationship has always been good. Let’s not forget that a part of our ICU patients were hospitalized in Puglia, Sicily. We are here, if necessary, ready to do our part.
He spoke of the relationship with the governors. How is yours with Fontana?
Excellent. We live a dramatic situation sharing choices, anger, frustrations. Tough months, also marked by discussions about the options to take. But the human and ancestral harmony that unites us has never failed.
Are you concerned about ongoing investigations?
We acted without thinking if our actions could be read in a malicious or benevolent way, we are sure that a serious judiciary, as is the vast majority of the Italian, will demonstrate it. Let’s move on, we are very focused on what to do. Let’s not release the tension.
What are you waiting for, councilor?
We hope to prepare for a less dramatic winter, with less pressure on hospitals. Covid-19, as some scientists pointed out, moves in an ignorant way, it does not follow the rules of other coronaviruses. Of course, today the car is very well shot.
[ad_2]
