Hope: in February I study to be ready to face an emergency

2020-04-21T21:10:12.086Z

Last February, the Ministry of Health elaborated a study, discussed by the technical scientific committee, "on what could have happened following a massive epidemic" by SarsCov2, with "a series of variables, to prepare for a possible emergency and understand how to intervene ". Health Minister Roberto Speranza explained it to 'Carta Bianca' on Rai3. It is "a credit from the government to have developed this study, to understand how to intervene," he stressed. "I gathered our task force on January 22nd, we started to work and a hypothetical study was elaborated in case of arrival of the virus. It was articulated on various hypotheses, better and also much worse" than what happened in Italy. "The study was developed in February - Speranza recalled - and some reaction measures were also indicated. I think it was a merit to have developed this study. On February 21 we signed the ordinance in the area of ​​Lodigiano, we were ready because we had done a forecast study. What we immediately understood was that we had to intervene harshly, otherwise the price in terms of lives would have been much higher than what we are already paying. In the world they looked at us thinking 'what are they doing' After a few weeks the vast majority of countries have adopted exactly the same Italian measures. During the work of the task force on the new coronavirus, set up at the Ministry of Health on January 22, explains the same ministry in a note - the need emerged to elaborate, by the Planning Department of the Ministry of Health, the Istituto Superiore di Sanità and INMI Spallanzani, a study on the possible scenarios of the epidemic and of the impact on the national health system, identifying a series of possible actions to be activated in relation to the development of the epidemic scenarios, in order to contain their effects. On February 12, the first version of this analysis, subsequently updated until March 4, was presented to the Technical-Scientific Committee for the necessary further study. At that stage, all the work of the Scientific and Technical Committee took place in a confidential form. "It should be remembered, the ministry underlines - that on February 14, ECDC, the European Union Agency for the prevention and control of diseases, still in one of his official documents, he gave "low" the possibility of spreading the contagion in Europe. At that time there were 3 contagions in Italy, all imported from China, and 46 cases in Europe. then contributed to the definition of the measures and measures adopted starting from February 21, after the discovery of the first Italian outbreaks ".