(Seguin) — The coronavirus numbers continue to grow here in the United States, but the numbers are even higher in places like Italy. The country been on lockdown for a few weeks now, in an attempt to further reduce the spread of the COVID-19 disease.
Ginervra Negri, 19, lives in Lecco, Italy. Lecco is a city on the southeastern shore of Lake Como in northern Italy. Negri, who’s better known as Ginni, is sharing some of her experiences with folks here Seguin. Negri spent last year as an exchange student at Seguin High School, and still has many friends here.
Italy has been hard hit by the coronavirus outbreak, with COVID-19 cases spiking throughout the country. Approximately 2,500 people have died because of the outbreak, including 345 deaths reported on Monday. Negri says schools are shut down and much of the country is on lockdown, as health officials work to slow down the spread of the virus.
Right now is about my third week that I’m not going to school. So my life is becoming stranger. And everyone is in their house (and) we can’t go out unless for necessities. It’s really strange. Like, if you need to go out, people are really worried to meet like a police officer, because you can even go to jail for like three months if you are doing something wrong, and it’s pretty scary. Everyday, you read the news about this coronavirus, and everyday there are a lot of people that are being infected, but there are even like other people who aren’t sick anymore. So some news (is) happier than others,” said Negri.
Negri says people initially didn’t take concerns about the virus that seriously, but she says that changed as the number of cases continued to spike.
“At the beginning, everyone was like ‘it’s just the flu’, so everyone was really doing nothing. Everyone was like going out but now, people are really worried, because it’s not stopping anymore, but it’s just spreading around — not only Europe. So everybody is really worried. During these three weeks, our feelings about this virus has been changed,” said Negri.
Negri says she’s looking forward to things eventually getting back to normal. She says her parents are still able to go out to work, but the closures are still impacting many Italian citizens.
“For now, schools in Italy are reopening the third of April, but this is what they say, but I really don’t think it’s going to happen. But for now, schools are closed (through) the third of April. My parents are actually going to work, because they have two shops that are like a necessity, so they are working. Most of the people are like staying home until their factories can reopen, or a lot of people are working from their house. They are just changing the way they used to work,” said Negri.
Negri admits that she was one of those people that didn’t think much about the virus when closures first started to occur, but now she has a better understanding of the challenges that the disease brought to Italy.
“I was one of the people that at the beginning was like ‘oh, it’s nothing’, but now I see that a lot of people, like old people are dying, or are in bad condition, so I’m worried about my grandparents. I think that people should think about our family (members) that are older than us, because they can get really sick. So just do what the government is…telling you — (like) to stay away from other people. For us, we need to stay one meter between you and another person (and) wash your hands a lot of times during the week. You just need to do that, because then if you don’t do it at the beginning, it’s going to become worse and worse everyday,” said Negri.
There have been a number of reports about the high rate of deaths recently in Italy. The 345 deaths were reported during the 24 hours that ended on Tuesday. That brought the total coronavirus death total up to 2,503 — an increase of roughly 16 percent. Negri says there are a number of steps being taken there to try to aggressively provide help to those who have been infected with the disease. She says they have places available for patients to go, and more resources are expected to come online soon.
“It’s not true for now that people are dying because they don’t have any place (to go for treatment), because there are enough places. I know a big campaign that in a few days gets four million euros to create an intensive therapy from a…center. They started to create, like into a hospital and in two weeks it’s going to be ready in Milan. So it’s not true that people are dying (that way), but I now that if a lot of people are becoming infected and they need this intensive therapy, the doctor will start to select people. But I also know that most the people that died are like old people, and if they are young, it’s because they had some problems with their lungs. For now, it’s not true that they are dying, because there is no place (for them to go). I know a lot of people that are infected, they can stay home, isolated like in a room…so you don’t have to go the hospital if it’s not serious enough,” said Negri.
Some health officials in the U.S. say that Italy’s situation, it’s high number of diagnoses and deaths should serve as a cautionary tale. They are encouraging more testing to be done across the United States, and President Donald Trump issued a more urgent warning to the nation.
The President warned that it could be July, August or later before the crisis is abated in the U.S. He urged older citizens to stay home and keep away from other people, and says that people should avoid crowds of more than 10 people. Trump on Monday also said the tumbling stock market will come back once the coronavirus threat is abated, and he stressed the need to help struggling airlines get through the crisis.
The number of cases is slowly rising here in Texas, but there have been no confirmed cases here in Guadalupe County. Three cases; however, have been diagnosed in neighboring Hays County.