Italian Doctor on How Virus 'Exploded', Having Coronavirus & How to Fight It

Dr Sylvia Bignamini is the Health Director of San Francesco Clinic in Bergamo, Italy, the city at the epicentre of the country's outbreak

She conducted the first coronavirus test in her nursing home and also caught the virus herself. She is now living and working in isolation at home.

Italian Town Erects Signs Warning Only People Respecting Its Christian Culture Will Be Welcome

One of the new signs erected in Pontoglio

THE TELEGRAPH: Signs, erected outside the town in Lombardy, criticised as racist and discriminatory

An Italian town has been accused of racism after erecting signs warning that only people who respect its “Christian traditions” are welcome.

The signs were put up this week outside Pontoglio, near Brescia in the Lombardy region of northern Italy, by its centre-Right council.

They declared the town, known in local dialect as Pontoi, to be a beacon of “Western culture and deep Christian traditions” and warned: “Those who do not intend to respect local culture and traditions are invited to stay away.”

Some residents branded the signs “racist” and “medieval”, who called for them to be taken down immediately.

The panels delivered a particularly hostile message to the town’s large foreign population. Of its 7,000 inhabitants, 1,160 or 16 per cent are foreign-born and many of them are Muslim.

They include 238 Albanians, 203 Moroccans, 192 Romanians and 150 Indians, many of whom have lived in Pontoglio for years and have families and regular jobs. » | Nick Squires, Rome | Friday, December 18, 2015

Italy's Lombardy Bans Burqas After Terror Attacks

THE TELEGRAPH: Northeastern region of Lombardy has amended legislation in order to outlaw the burqa and niqab from public offices and hospitals

Lombardy, the most populous and wealthiest region in Italy, has approved a ban on wearing the Islamic veil and burqa in hospitals and local government offices in the wake of recent terrorist attacks in Europe.

Current law across Italy already prohibits helmets, clothing or any other items that make identification difficult in public places without a justifiable motive.

But the new legislation in Lombardy, which comes into force on January 1, 2016, marks the first time an Italian region has explicitly outlawed Islamic face coverings.

Simona Bordonali, head of security, civil protection and immigration in Lombardy, said “serious terror attacks” in recent weeks had forced the region to reinforce its security measures. » | Alice Philipson, Rome | Friday, December 11, 2015