A 78-year-old Italian is the first European to die after being infected with the new coronavirus in Italy, where part of the north of the country is barricaded after several cases of contamination.
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The man had been hospitalized for ten days in Veneto, in northern Italy, for a disease unrelated to the coronavirus, said Minister of Health Roberto Speranza on Friday evening.
Adriano Trevisan, a retired bricklayer, was one of the two infected in Veneto, while five doctors and ten other people were also identified as carriers of the new coronavirus in Lombardy. They apparently frequented the same bar and the same group of friends.
Drastic measures
This wave of contamination has forced the Italian authorities to take drastic measures.
In total, 20 cases of contamination have been identified in Italy, the country most affected in Europe by the epidemic of viral pneumonia which started in China in December.
Bars, schools, churches and stadiums: public places were closed for a week on Friday in eleven cities in northern Italy. The measure also affects libraries, town halls, shops as well as the numerous carnival parades organized at this time of the year.
The decision was taken by the health ministry after a first Italian indigenous home was identified in Codogno, near Lodi, with the contamination of 14 people including a 38-year-old man hospitalized since Wednesday.
In this area located about 60 km southeast of Milan, more than 50,000 people are in semi-confinement at home. In addition, 40 stadiums and sports halls will be closed to amateur football matches as well as places of worship.
“We are basically asking residents to stay at home in the areas affected by the epidemic,” said the Minister of Health during a press conference in Rome with representatives of the Lombardy region.
In Veneto, the president of the region, Luca Zaia, spoke of two “suspected cases” aged 78 and 67, including one person “in critical condition” and “placed in intensive care”, in Vo ‘Euganeo, a nearby town of Padua practically in quarantine. Although the Ministry of Health has indicated that these cases have not been confirmed as due to the new coronavirus.
Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, questioned in Brussels by the Italian press, wanted to be reassuring by stressing that Italy “applies a very high level of precaution”.
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