Coronavirus in Italy: reinforcement and maximum mobilization of health services

Text by: Éric Senanque

233 dead and nearly 6,000 contaminations. Italy continues to fight against coronavirus: to cope with the epidemic, the government has decided to massively reinforce its health system. And at the Vatican, the Pope will not appear Sunday for the Angelus prayer.

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From our correspondent in Rome,

20,000 positions, including 5,000 medical specialists, 10,000 nurses and 5,000 caregiver workers. The Italian government has gone to great lengths to counter the coronavirus epidemic.

The decree issued this Saturday morning in the Council of Ministers is ambitious: it should make it possible to increase the beds in intensive care units by 50%. Above all, it wants to mobilize all the forces necessary to deal with the emergency.

Retired doctors are thus recalled and students at the end of the medical course can integrate medical teams more easily. An allocation of 600 million euros was immediately released to pay for these medical personnel.

Another measure also announced: the possible requisition of hotels by regional prefects, to put people in quarantine. Italian Minister of Health Roberto Speranza asked for the cooperation of all citizens to overcome the epidemic.

For its part, the Vatican, where a case of contamination has been identified, isolates itself: Sunday and for the first time, Pope Francis will not appear at the window of the apostolic palace for the prayer of the Angelus, but will his meditation locked in his library in front of a camera which will broadcast live on the internet.

► Read also: The whole of Italy hit by the coronavirus epidemic, the schools closed

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• Coronavirus
• Italy
• Health and Medicine
• Vatican

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