ALL QUIET ON THE ITALIAN FRONT

Italy is on the front lines of the COVID-19 virus in Europe.  Reported cases as of yesterday rose to almost 25,000 with around 1,800 deaths.  The country has been on a near total lock down for almost a week, after a partial lock down in Lombardia (which includes Milan) and surrounding areas failed to stanch the logarithmic explosion of cases.  Still the virus rages.  

Silvia Merler, the head of research at the Algebris Policy and Research Forum in Turin, has posted on Twitter a sobering coronavirus lag tracker which compares the viral progression in Lombardia against that in Wuhan, as well as the progression in Italy against that in China.  The acceleration is nearly identical.  Building on that, Ms. Mercer tracked infection rates in other EU countries, as well as the US (despite incomplete data).  They all follow the China/Italian model, which gives us an idea of how long we have to shut everything down except supermarkets, pharmacies, and health system points of service before the cases explode.  

If Ms. Merler’s analysis is correct, Germany is about nine days behind Italy and the U.S. is about 16 days behind.  Because of the paucity of U.S. testing data, I expect the U.S. has many more cases than reported, and therefore likely fewer than 16 days to get its shit together. Here is a link to the lag tracker, which is updated daily:  Algebris Lag Tracker

We generally head to Italy in April and return to Berlin in early June.  Not this year.  To keep up with people I care about who live there, I’ve been in contact by phone, email, and WhatsApp with friends in Tuscany, Umbria, and Palermo.  Here are their dispatches from the front lines.

A.I. FROM PALERMO

February 26:  Hi dear.  Here we are in a panic.  By you?  You can’t find masks or hand sanitizer here.

February 27*:  Ciao, how are you?  How is it there?  Here we’re in a total lock down.  It seems like the Cold War.  My son should have returned from London, he got a job in Taormina, but he remains stuck there.  They won’t let him come home.  Here there is no one in the streets, neither on foot nor in cars.  It’s totally surreal.  We hope this doesn’t reach you, at least not at this level.  We’re OK but in total isolation, everyone shut up in his own house.  But take this seriously.  This virus is deadly.

*Note the date.  This total lock down was the writing on the wall, and it was imposed 14 days before Trump banned travel to the U.S. from certain EU states, including Italy.  In other words, until March 11, Trump did nothing at all to keep Americans safe except ban travel into the U.S. from China on January 31.  Are you getting this?  Nothing.  Zero.

Today:  Ciao, cara.  We’re still completely isolated at home.  I’m working from home [she teaches violin at a music school] via video calls with my students.  My mother [who has dementia] no longer goes to the senior center.  I alternate her care with her caretaker.  I am concerned for my son, who is stuck in London where everything is very confused and he’s at risk, given that he works in the hospitality industry.  We tried to contact our government minister but couldn’t reach her.  Here Musumeci [a minister] has cut off all connections between Sicily and the mainland.  The situation is absurd.  Psychologists call and offer appointments for psychological problems resulting from this isolation.  My mother is well but she wants to go out.  She doesn’t understand.  And let’s not even talk about the economic aspects.  A catastrophe.  How are you?

L.S. FROM PALERMO

March 15, via phone:  The city is on total lock down.  The police are everywhere.  I can't circulate within the city by car, bus, bicycle, or on foot unless I self-certify to a policeman in writing that I am either going to the supermarket or on a trip for health reasons (the pharmacy, the doctor, or the hospital).  I go out in the early morning in my running clothes with my yoga mat and the police let me walk to the Foro Italico, where I can do yoga alone, because it's for health reasons, provided I return straightaway by the same route.  I heard some teenage girls yesterday complaining about not being able to kiss and hug their friends, saying this was impossible for a Sicilian.  I said, "Get over it!  Worry about dying."

M.T. FROM PALERMO

March 16:  Cara Marilyn e caro Steve,

Thank you for your kind mail.  My family and myself are good and in good shape, no problem so far. We are lucky.  Anyway we are all very worried, my sister lives in Milan, she is a doctor and her partner too, they say that hospitals are very busy, and all the health system is on the edge of collapse.  Still it’s amazing to have a public health system.  My father (doctor as well) lives in Trapani with my mum.  Here in Sicily the emergency is nothing like Milan, but there is a lot of attention, a lot of police in the street and quite a lot of control.

I feel that everybody is worried by this situation, it is very strange feeling not being able move in our city or in Europe, but the quarantine is a very necessary measure.  And it’s by strange not being able to have human connection, it will last a bit more, at least until the 6th of April, but I believe until after Easter.  Almost like this year has only 11 months, and it’s a huge concern for all the business that are closed and will be closed for some more weeks.

It will great to see you again and hug again.  Please be safe in Berlin, avoid crowds and wear disposable gloves when you go out if you can.

L.G. FROM PALERMO

 March 15:  Dearest Marilyn  We're fine. We have been locked in the house for five days, except for S. who goes to work, even if she will practice Smart working from Monday. We resist and wait for the peak of the virus to pass. Here, everything is closed except food and necessities. Thanks for the thought and we reciprocate good wishes for you too. A hug for you and Steve.  See you soon.

S.P. FROM A SMALL VILLAGE IN UMBRIA

March 8:  Interesting article in NY Times about how the disruption caused by the virus is making us rethink the benefits of globalisation. I think Umbria has 16 cases and one full recovery. We are not so far from the affected areas so we may get quarantined at some point. We have €[XXX] in cash and plenty of pasta....Jeez, what a schamozzle (or however you spell it) . Stay safe, guys xx.

Later, same day:  Popped into Trestina today and saw our first person sporting a mask. That was in the supermarket. Everything else normal, but I expect to see TP changing hands on the black market shortly....

March 15:  You have a balcony ? Start singing...(probably not a very German thing to do..) L. still employed but at home. Because we are out of town we can go walking, so we do. Weather is sunny and 14C - 18C so we can get out and suffer less from cabin fever. L. was at the supermarket this morning and still no sign of panic buying. They have pretty much everything.

No going to Serone [a local bar], though...except for ciggies apparently. Our hot water system broke down, but will get repaired tomorrow..plumbers and electricians can still work. Umbria doing well under the circumstances. Weirdly quiet out there...so few cars you would think we were still in black and white. 

 

C.M. FROM OUR SMALL SETTLEMENT IN TUSCANY

March 16:  Hello, in Valuberti everything is normal, more or less; also health, at least we hope .... Here isolation and "quarantine" have no effect and spring imposes the usual jobs, vineyard, olive trees, grass, vegetable garden …..Let's hope to resist the attack of the virus that especially hits the elderly, as if it were sent by the bodies that provide pensions .....

S.B. FROM A NEIGHBORING SETTLEMENT IN TUSCANY

March 15:  Hi Marilyn,
We were very pleased that you thought of us. For now we are all well, in Castiglion Fiorentino only one case of illness has been recorded. We are not calm because the situation is serious, however at Fiume [the name of her settlement] we defend ourselves well from contagion.  We hope everything goes well, also to you in Germany.

That's S.'s grandfather above.

These first person reports below from doctors in the hardest hit regions of Italy, published on March 16 in Huffpost, are frightening and touching:

DR. MARCO VERGANO, FROM TURIN

Told HuffPost via email that it’s “evident” to him that “acting like a community, rather than personally feeling violated in individual freedom will be more difficult for Americans than for Europeans.” Americans, Vergano said, “should stop believing that COVID-19 is a ‘bad flu’” and “stop circulating low quality information and ‘fake news.’” The U.S. “should abandon woefully incompetent political leaders, that in an unprecedented emergency like this can lead the country to a catastrophe,” Vergano advised. “They should not panic; but in case restrictive measures are difficult to enforce without panic, well... then a bit of ‘fruitful panic’ may be useful!” He said Americans should take “advantage of the few weeks between Italy and US.”

CRISTINA HIGGINS FROM BERGAMO

Americans and some Europeans “are weeks away from where we are today in Italy.

You have a chance to make a difference and stop the spread in your country,” Higgins wrote. “Push for the entire office to work at home today, cancel birthday parties, and other gatherings, stay home as much as you can. If you have a fever, any fever, stay home. Push for school closures, now. Anything you can do to stop the spread, because it is spreading in your communities – there is a two week incubation period – and if you do these things now you can buy your medical system time.” 

DR. DANIEL MACCHINI FROM BERGAMO

…wrote in a heartbreaking Facebook post that Italy has so many patients it’s impossible to give all of them adequate care.

“The display boards with the names of the sick, of different colors depending on the operating unit they belong to, are now all red and instead of the surgical operation there is the diagnosis, which is always the same cursed: bilateral interstitial pneumonia,” Macchini wrote in her essay, according to a translation.

“The epidemiological disaster is taking place. And there are no more surgeons, urologists, orthopedists, we are only doctors who suddenly become part of a single team to face this tsunami that has overwhelmed us,” Macchini wrote. “The cases multiply, we arrive at the rate of 15-20 hospitalizations a day all for the same reason. The results of the swabs now come one after the other: positive, positive, positive. Suddenly the emergency room is collapsing.” 

Macchini warned people to stay away from “the theater, museums or gym” and to have “mercy on that myriad of older people you could exterminate. Please, listen to us, try to leave the house only for indispensable things,” he added.

Yet not everything is quiet on the Italian front; not everything is sad and a little terrifying.  The Italians are fighting back.  They are fighting for their lives and their way of life.  Instead of manning the barricades, they are manning the balconies.  Listen to the DJ music, the arias, and the banging pots and pans and look at the smart phones glowing as they declare their indomitable spirit via this video link balcony musicians.  VIVA ITALIA!  

We need the Italians' irrepressible joy and lust for life today, in this very moment, more than ever.  But if we don't want the "All quiet on the Italian front" to engulf the German front, the French front, the American front, and on and on, then we simply must listen to what the Italians are desperately trying to tell us.  Beneath the joie de vivre there is some very serious messaging going on:  Time is running out.  You must cancel everything NOW so we can begin together again.

Keep it real!  Stay inside!  Get tested!

Marilyn