Pedestrians stroll the Via Montenapoleone fashion district in Milan, decorated with seasonal lights.
Highlight
- Italy on Thursday tightened anti-epidemic rules for the Christmas, New Year holidays
- The cabinet unanimously approved the decree imposing new restrictions which will come into force soon.
- The move comes after several mayors, regional officials canceled all public events at the festivities.
Italy on Thursday tightened anti-epidemic rules for the Christmas and New Year holidays amid concerns over rising omicron cases across the country. The cabinet unanimously approved a decree to introduce new restrictions that will go into effect over the next few days, including a ban on public gatherings for Christmas and New Year’s Eve.
The move comes after several mayors and regional officials canceled all public events in celebration. According to the new rule, discos and nightclubs will have to be closed till 31 January 2022.
Health Minister Roberto Speranza told a news conference that the validity of the Health Green Pass certificate has been reduced from nine months to six months to prevent the spread of the highly infectious Omicron variant. The decree reduces the time required between the completion of full vaccination (two doses) and the administration of a booster dose from five months to four months.
“This is a difficult phase … and we are implementing measures that we think will provide further protection to citizens and our public health system,” the minister said.
Face masks are required in every outdoor location, as well as to use only FFP2 masks—which provide greater protection—on public transport and in public indoor spaces.
According to earlier restrictions imposed on December 6, only those vaccinated and recovering, who hold a so-called “Super Green Pass”, will be allowed to sit in restaurants and bars, theatres, discos, stadiums and other sports facilities. Still, the rapid rise in new cases with the upcoming Christmas and New Year holidays prompted officials to move on.
The new restrictions were decided after the National Institutes of Health (ISS) shared the results of a preliminary survey on the spread of the highly infectious Omikron variant with the cabinet on Thursday. According to data based on nearly 2,000 swabs taken on December 20, Omicron represented 28 percent of new infections.
ISS President Silvio Brusaferro said, “Although preliminary estimates confirm that the variant spread has a high speed, which produces large outbreaks in a short period of time, and is expected to prevail, as it has already Happening in many other European countries.” said in a statement.
Italy has seen a surge in new infections and deaths, yet the daily caseload has so far been below that of some other major European countries. Nonetheless, the increase is significant, with more than 44,500 new infections in 24 hours on Thursday, which marked the highest daily increase since the start of the pandemic.
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