Daily sum up - #ItalyVsCovid-19
On the first Sunday of Italian lockdown, Pope Francis escaped the Vatican for a pilgrimage in a Church in Rome’s center and Prefecture of Holy See announced all the celebrations on Holy Week will take place without physical presence of worshippers. Meanwhile the Italian Government is working relentlessly on Decree-Law to fight COVID-19 and its consequences, with an allocation of around €20 bn. Roberto Gualtieri, Minister of the Economy and Finance, guarantees that no one will be left behind. As per our insights, the draft text focused on the most urgent measures for Health System both for a massive reinforcement of medical staff and for the production and distribution of health disposals. It’s high probable the Decree Law will contain the appointment of the Special Commissioner in charge of implementing and coordinating the measures to contrast epidemiological emergency. Furthermore it would contain urgent fiscal and economic measures: special rules on ordinary pay supplement and ordinary allowance for workers, suspension of fiscal deadlines, specific funds for SMEs and most impacted sectors, like tourism, culture, agriculture. Presumably it will be the first step and it will be followed by successive interventions, after the acute emergency phase.
Even if priorities could be further shaped by the requests of the opposition. Matteo Salvini denounces the lack of reimbursements for those who have complied with tomorrow’s tax deadlines and social security contributions. Giorgia Meloni, Salvini’s ally, advocates for a State-funded campaign of mass sanitation of workplaces, together with the deployment of adequate anti-contagion protections for all the workers. Antonio Tajani, Deputy President of center-right’s Forza Italia, requests a dramatic cut on bureaucracy and a massive industry conversion to accommodate the urgent healthcare needs.
Meanwhile, the crisis between the League-ruled Lombardy and the Government regarding the management of the emergency and supply of medicaments is reviving issues of the Italian decentralized system and the autonomist requests by Northern Regions. The medicaments’ supply crisis has been tackled also by Foreign Affairs Minister Luigi Di Maio, which strongly denounces Countries that are blocking exports of masks, on the same page the President of EU Commission, Von Der Leyen, who has intervened today to recall a European response through the adoption of an export authorization scheme for protective equipments going out of Europe, considering as priority its sharing among Member States, within EU soil, also due to data on the spread of the COVID-19 to other EU Countries, which could probably affect another EU pillar: the free movement of people, waiting for the Eurogroup meeting scheduled tomorrow with COVID-19 economic policy challenges on the agenda.
At the moment we close our Daily sum up #2, the Preparatory Meeting of Council of Ministers on the Decree Law to support health system, companies, SMEs and workers is still ongoing.
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