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  • Pandemic: 24-hour death toll falls for fifth consecutive day in Italy

Deaths in Italy with coronaviruses amount to 18,279 this Thursday, with 610 in a single day (yesterday 542), a figure that breaks the downward trend of daily deaths, while infections are also increasing. The total cases since the virus was detected on February 20 are 143,626, 4,204 more than on Wednesday (3,836). Today's case data is the highest since April 5, Civil Protection has reported.

The disease has already killed a hundred health workers in Italy, the federation that groups the union informed AFP on Thursday. "The number of doctors killed by the virus is one hundred. Perhaps 101 at the moment , unfortunately," said spokesmen for the National Federation of the Order of Doctors in Surgery and Dentistry.

The website of this federation wears a black ribbon as a sign of mourning and updates the names of all the deceased doctors every day, some of whom have already retired and returned to the service to help the health services overwhelmed by the number of patients .

"We cannot allow our doctors, our health workers, to be sent to fight the virus with bare hands," wrote Filippo Anelli , president of the Federation, on the entity's website. "It is an unequal combat that hurts us, that hurts citizens, hurts the country," Anelli concluded.

Thirty nurses, male nurses and medical assistants have also died from COVID-19, according to the Italian media. The Higher Institute of Health puts approximately 10% of those infected belonging to health personnel.

In Lombardy, the region most affected in the north, today received 73 doctors from other parts of the country to assist in this phase of "slowdown" of the pandemic, held the regional director of Civil Protection, Pietro Foroni. "A very important and valuable aid in this emergency. We hope this will be a downward phase but we cannot let our guard down and we must assure hospital centers of the necessary presence of medical personnel," Foroni said in a statement.

The region's president, Attilio Fontana, previously assured that the infection data "is also improving today." Lombardy has also seen in recent days a reduction in pressure from its hospitals , which have sometimes been on the verge of collapse.

Increased controls

Italian authorities focus their efforts on Thursday to prevent displacements to occur to second homes. To this end, the police have intensified controls on all roads that enter and leave cities, and in municipalities on vacation.

Complaints from resident citizens reporting an increase in their populations are coming from different areas of the transalpine country, suggesting that many have already 'escaped' to second homes . For this reason, the "recommendation" to the security forces is to tighten surveillance at vacation destinations and stop most of those on the street to see if they really have a justification for being there.

The directives that the Ministry of the Interior will send in the next few hours, but that have also been verbally anticipated by the police chief, Franco Gabrielli , go through intensifying the controls also next week, when many should return to their place of residence or home. .

This weekend is considered strategic in keeping the epidemic curve under control and therefore stopping coronavirus infection. The calls to stay at home by the Government have intensified, more if possible, precisely because the R0 -the contagion rate- came to be below 1 this week. Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte has insisted that " We must not frustrate the efforts made so far. " And Rome warns: everyone who is caught on the street without justification faces a fine of 400 to 3,000 euros , in the most serious cases.

The official calendar drawn so far from Rome states that until April 13 all Italians will remain confined. Only after the holidays can you think about reopening some companies and planning the different steps to follow in each region, taking into account the contagion rates.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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