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Italian airline begins ‘Covid-tested’ flights from Rome to Milan

Alitalia is offering two flights a day exclusively for passengers who have tested negative for coronavirus.

Italian airline begins 'Covid-tested' flights from Rome to Milan
Alitalia passengers have the option to get tested on departure at Rome's Fiumicino airport. Photo: Andreas Solaro/AFP

The airline's 'Covid-tested' flights start on September 16th between Rome and Milan, with passengers offered a free rapid antigen test before they board.

While several Italian airports already provide testing for arriving passengers, it is the first time that departing passengers are also being urged to take a test.

The service, which is being trialled for a month but could be expanded, isn't required by any government restrictions but is instead designed to reassure travellers wary of flying.

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From now until October 16th, to board either of Alitalia's flights AZ 2038 (leaving at 13:30) or AZ 2092 (17:30) from Rome Fiumicino to Milan Linate, passengers must show proof that they have tested negative.

Passengers planning to take the test at Fiumicino airport are advised to arrive at least an hour and a half before their flight. They can go directly from the departures area to a testing centre in Terminal 3 (find a map here), where they will be given a nasal swab that can reveal within 30 minutes whether or not they have the coronavirus.

They must wait in the testing centre for the results: if it's negative they can proceed to the gate; if it's positive they'll be put in isolation, given a molecular (PCR) swab test to confirm the result and if necessary, instructed on quarantine procedures.


Passengers wait to be tested at Fiumicino airport in Rome. Photo: Alberto Pizzoli/AFP

Alternatively passengers can get tested before the day of their flight, in which case they'll need to bring with them to the airport the result of either a PCR or antigen swab test carried out no more than 72 hours earlier.

Passengers who don't want to get tested can switch to any of Alitalia's other Rome-Milan flights at no additional cost, while passengers who are denied boarding after testing positive can get a full refund.

Children under six are not obliged to take a test.

Fiumicino was one of the first airports in Italy to set up an onsite testing centre and has been commended by airport reviewer Skytrax for its Covid-19 safety measures, recently earning the site's only five-star rating of any airport in the world.

In addition to the testing facility in Terminal 3, Fiumicino also operates a 24-hour drive-through testing centre in its car park that is the largest of its kind in Italy.

Under the Italian government's current rules, getting a coronavirus test is mandatory for passengers arriving from Spain, Greece, Croatia or Malta.

Travellers from other countries are not required to get tested, nor does Italy oblige departing passengers to take a test.

READ ALSO: What to expect when you're flying to Italy

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ROME

Rome square filled with coffins in protest over Italy’s workplace deaths

A thousand coffins filled one of Rome's most famous squares on Tuesday as a trade union made a powerful statement on Italy's high number of deaths in accidents at work.

Rome square filled with coffins in protest over Italy's workplace deaths

“Every year, one thousand people go to work and don’t come home,” read a large sign displayed next to the 1,041 cardboard coffins set up around the obelisk in the centre of the Piazza del Popolo.

“Zero is still too far away,” read another sign in the square as curious tourists took snapshots.

Last year, 1,041 people died in workplace accidents in Italy.

“We brought these coffins here to raise awareness, to remind everyone of the need to act, to not forget those who have lost their lives,” Pierpaolo Bombardini, general secretary of the UIL union behind the protest told AFPTV.

The protest was also intended “to ask the government and politicians to do something concrete to prevent these homicides” he added.

“Because these are homicides. When safety rules are violated, they are not accidents, but homicides.”

Cardboard coffins fill Rome’s Piazza del Popolo on March 19th in a protest by the Italian Labor Union (UIL) intended to draw public attention to the number of deaths at work in Italy. (Photo by Tiziana FABI / AFP)

Fatal accidents in the workplace regularly make headlines in the Italian press, each time sparking a debate on risk prevention. Most recently a concrete structure collapsed on the construction site of a supermarket in Florence last month, killing five people working at the site.

Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni denounced it as “another story… of people who go out to work, who simply go out to do their job, and do not come home”.

Bombardini called for an increase in the number of inspections and inspectors.

“Companies that violate safety standards must be closed down,” he added. According to Eurostat’s most recent statistics, from 2021, on EU-wide workplace fatalities, Italy had 3.17 deaths per 100,000 workers.

That was above the European average of 2.23 per 100,000 works but behind France at 4.47 and Austria at 3.44.

The European Union’s three worst-faring countries are Lithuania, Malta and Latvia, while work-related fatalities are lowest in the Netherlands, Finland and Germany.

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