Italy to extend lockdown; France may do so as well

ROME/MADRID/PARIS/LONDON • Lockdown measures in Italy, the European country worst hit by the coronavirus pandemic, will be extended beyond their original deadline, Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said yesterday.

Imposed nationally on March 12, the shutdown of most businesses and a ban on public gatherings are due to expire next Wednesday.

School closures and other measures, such as a ban on fan attendance at sporting events, are due to carry on until April 3.

"The measures we have taken... must be extended beyond their original deadline," Mr Conte told the Corriere della Sera newspaper.

He expressed hope that the country will hit a peak in a few days, and see a decline in infection rates.

But he warned that Italy "will not be able to return immediately to life as it was before", even after the worst is over.

The pandemic has killed almost 3,000 people and infected more than 35,700 in Italy. There were more than 475 deaths between Tuesday and Wednesday, the worst single-day toll in a country.

Mr Attilio Fontana, the regional governor of the worst-hit province of Lombardy, said that if significant numbers of doctors and nurses succumbed to the disease, the country risked "disaster".

Video shot by locals in Bergamo town in Lombardy showed military trucks removing coffins overnight from the local cemetery, which was overwhelmed by the scale of the outbreak.

Spain, the second worst-hit in Europe, said yesterday that the deaths from the virus had jumped by nearly 30 per cent to 767. The number of new cases rose by 25 per cent to 17,147, bringing the tally near that of Iran, the world's third-most affected nation, after China and Italy. Madrid is the worst-hit area, accounting for 40 per cent of the total cases and about two-thirds of deaths.

The government plans to introduce more measures to protect vulnerable groups, Deputy Prime Minister Pablo Iglesias said.

In France, officials said a two-week lockdown is likely to be extended. This comes as news reports showed groups of people strolling in parks and the 1m safe interpersonal distance being frequently ignored.

Some officials have called for even stricter limits, and Paris police are mulling over closing riverside walkways - a move already enforced in Bordeaux. The country has more than 9,100 cases and over 260 deaths.

One of the patients in France is the European Union's chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier, who announced yesterday that he had been infected. "I am as well as I can be, strictly confined to my home," the 69-year-old Frenchman said in a video posted on Twitter.

Britain will close all schools indefinitely from today as it ramps up controls that have already seen museums, cafes and other social businesses shuttered.

The city's transport authorities yesterday closed dozens of underground train stations, but said they would maintain the system to enable critical workers to make essential journeys.

The government yesterday denied it was planning to restrict travel in and out of London after the rumour mill went into overdrive.

"There are no plans to close down the transport network in London," said Prime Minister Boris Johnson's spokesman.

"And there is zero prospect of any restriction being placed on travelling in or out of London."

Britain has more than 2,600 cases and 108 deaths.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, REUTERS