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HEALTH

Delta variant in Italy will be ‘prevalent within 10 days’: health official

As the summer season gets underway and crowds gather to watch Italy play in major sporting events, the country needs to brace itself for an upturn in new coronavirus infections, the Italian deputy health minister said on Monday.

Published: 12 July 2021 18:31 CEST
Updated: 15 July 2021 10:10 CEST
Delta variant in Italy will be 'prevalent within 10 days': health official
Sporting events draw crowds - and risk new surges in the spread of the coronavirus. (Photo by Piero CRUCIATTI / AFP)

The euphoria of Italy fans seeing their national football team claim the Euro 2020 title could soon be dampened as the effect of social gatherings makes itself felt, Pierpaolo Sileri told Radio 24 in an interview.

“It’s great to see people in the squares, but we will inevitably see the number of infections rise. The Delta variant will spread and become dominant sooner than expected,” said Sileri.

“I fear by the end of the month [there will be] three to four times the contagions that we have today,” he warned.

READ ALSO: Italian health minister urges caution as Delta variant fuels increase in new cases

Sileri predicts that the Delta variant of coronavirus will overtake the currently dominant Alpha variant within just ten days, he told newspaper La Stampa

He echoed recent warnings from the WHO, saying the trend would be partially accelerated by people gathering in large numbers to watch football and tennis matches.

With a potential resurgence in cases, some lockdown measures could be reintroduced.

“There is no need to reinstate the obligation to wear a mask outdoors, but controls should be strengthened in case of gatherings,” said Sileri.

“We need constant vigilance, we need to strengthen controls in nightlife areas, because where you don’t keep your distance you have to wear a mask, otherwise sanctions must be applied.”

EXPLAINED: When do you still need to wear a mask in Italy?

He went on to say that Italy’s health situation could evolve in the same way that the UK’s did, claiming that the number of infections “will continue to grow” through the summer.

Italy is currently experiencing a rise in coronavirus cases due to the Delta variant after 15 weeks of falling figures, according to the latest weekly monitoring report by the Higher Health Institute (ISS), which reports that the Delta and Kappa strains together account for nearly 28 percent of new infections in Italy compared to 5 percent in May.

The health authorities say that new cases are mainly among those who are unvaccinated or have only had their first dose.

Over 44 percent of the population over 12 years old has been vaccinated, the latest government figures show, but “there will be a gradual increase in the number of people who have been vaccinated with a double dose, and by September we will be around 70 to 75 percent immunised,” according to Sileri.

READ ALSO: How many people in Italy still aren’t vaccinated?

Yet vaccinations alone aren’t enough, according to Andrea Crisanti, director of the department of microbiology at the University of Padua.

The Delta variant is “one step away from becoming vaccine-resistant, so the less it is transmitted the better,” he told Rai news. “I think we should combine the vaccination campaign and at the same time strengthen our tracking capacity,” he added.

Not only are vaccinations and tracing those who test positive for Covid-19 hoped to help stem the rise in new infections, but “some backward steps” also can’t be ruled out, Sileri said.

He hinted at a possible reinstatement of the country’s colour system in some regions. The various tiers of zones classify the level of health risk and set corresponding restrictions.

Supporters of the Italian national football team celebrate their teams’ first goal in the UEFA EURO 2020 final football match between England and Italy, at the Piazza del Popolo fanzone, in Rome on July 11, 2021. (Photo by Filippo MONTEFORTE / AFP)

Italy’s 20 regions are all currently placed in the lowest-risk ‘white zones‘, where most restrictions have now been dropped. But Sileri said that they could be reintroduced and that authorities may even bring back the highest-risk red zones, which could be activated at a local level.

“However, we will have to refer to the number of hospitalisations rather than to the number of infections,” he added.

READ ALSO: Everything that changes in Italy in July 2021

“At the moment the number of infections is small and there is no need for some regions to return to the [low-medium risk] yellow zone. It is clear, however, that if we were to have an explosion of cases, admissions and hospital pressure, we would have to take a step back. Today there is no such risk,” he said.

But Maria van Kerkhove, an infectious disease epidemiologist and Covid-19 technical lead at the WHO, sounded a more urgent alarm.

She described watching the final between Italy and England as “devastating” in a post on Twitter.

Italy’s health minister Roberto Speranza also voiced his worries about the consequences of people going on holiday and gathering to watch sporting events.

He said: “The European football championship and the Wimbledon tournament are over, and the Azzurri are the main players. It is a great joy after terrible months. Even in these moments of national pride we never forget that our ‘game’ to defeat Covid is not yet won,” reported news agency Ansa.

“Let’s support our champions responsibly, remembering the rules of spacing and using masks correctly,” he added.

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HEALTH

Italy’s schools warned to ‘avoid gatherings’ as Covid cases rise

As Italy’s new school year began, masks and hand sanitiser were distributed in schools and staff were asked to prevent gatherings to help stem an increase in Covid infections.

Published: 11 September 2023 12:48 CEST
Italy’s schools warned to ‘avoid gatherings’ as Covid cases rise

Pupils returned to school in many parts of Italy on Monday and authorities said they were distributing masks and hand sanitiser amid a post-summer increase in the number of recorded cases of Covid–19.

“The advice coming from principals, teachers and janitors is to avoid gatherings of students, especially in these first days of school,” Mario Rusconi, head of Italy’s Principals’ Association, told Rai news on Monday.

He added that local authorities in many areas were distributing masks and hand sanitizer to schools who had requested them.

“The use of personal protective equipment is recommended for teachers and students who are vulnerable,” he said, confirming that “use is not mandatory.”

A previous requirement for students to wear masks in the classroom was scrapped at the beginning of the last academic year.

Walter Ricciardi, former president of the Higher Health Institute (ISS), told Italy’s La Stampa newspaper on Monday that the return to school brings the risk of increased Covid infections.

Ricciardi described the health ministry’s current guidelines for schools as “insufficient” and said they were “based on politics rather than scientific criteria.”

READ ALSO:

Recorded cases of Covid have increased in most Italian regions over the past three weeks, along with rates of hospitalisation and admittance to intensive care, as much of the country returns to school and work following the summer holidays.

Altogether, Italy recorded 21,309 new cases in the last week, an increase of 44 percent compared to the 14,863 seen the week before.

While the World Health Organisation said in May that Covid was no longer a “global health emergency,” and doctors say currently circulating strains of the virus in Italy are not a cause for alarm, there are concerns about the impact on elderly and clinically vulnerable people with Italy’s autumn Covid booster campaign yet to begin.

“We have new variants that we are monitoring but none seem more worrying than usual,” stated Fabrizio Maggi, director of the Virology and Biosafety Laboratories Unit of the Lazzaro Spallanzani Institute for Infectious Diseases in Rome

He said “vaccination coverage and hybrid immunity can only translate into a milder disease in young and healthy people,” but added that “vaccinating the elderly and vulnerable continues to be important.”

Updated vaccines protecting against both flu and Covid are expected to arrive in Italy at the beginning of October, and the vaccination campaign will begin at the end of October, Rai reported.

Amid the increase in new cases, Italy’s health ministry last week issued a circular mandating Covid testing on arrival at hospital for patients with symptoms.

Find more information about Italy’s current Covid-19 situation and vaccination campaign on the Italian health ministry’s website (available in English).

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