Italy to shut terminal at main Rome airport

ROME • Rome's main airport will close one of its two terminals, while its second airport will be shut to passenger traffic, officials said yesterday, after thousands of flights were cancelled due to the coronavirus.

The authorities are also considering shutting Milan's Linate airport, currently being used for domestic flights, and an unspecified number of regional airports to try to halt the contagion, a government source said.

Rome's Fiumicino airport will close its main terminal on Tuesday, Aeroporti di Roma said in a statement, while Ciampino airport, used by budget airlines, will close tomorrow.

Flights in and out of both airports have already slowed to a trickle and its normally packed carparks were almost deserted.

Italy is the worst affected in Europe from the coronavirus outbreak, with more than 820 deaths and over 12,400 confirmed cases.

The rapid spread of the illness has persuaded many countries to cut travel links, while many foreign airliners, including easyJet and British Airways, have shuttered their operations.

As part of a raft of measures, the Italian government has banned all non-essential travel and public gatherings until April 3, and closed schools and universities nationwide.

On Wednesday, it added new restrictions after reporting the highest daily increase in deaths of any country since the outbreak.

Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said all shops would be shuttered except supermarkets, food stores and chemists, and companies must close all their departments that are not essential to production.

Businesses such as hairdressers and beauty parlours will also be closed, along with bars and restaurants that cannot guarantee they can keep a distance of at least 1m between customers.

Most Italians are following his advice, with streets and squares deserted up and down the country of 60 million people.

Most cases are in the Lombardy region in the country's wealthy north, but virologists have warned the disease risks becoming an epidemic in the poorer south too.

In Naples, it is a race against time at Cardarelli hospital, where a new intensive care unit is being assembled as southern Italy's underfunded and overstretched healthcare system braces itself for an epidemic.

The rooms in "Building M" have been stripped out, with just the last few gurneys to be removed before new life-saving equipment, medicines and supplies can be installed in the "Coronavirus Wing".

Of the 5,400 or so intensive care beds in Italy, the seven southern regions and islands counted just 1,582 between them, according to the Repubblica daily.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, REUTERS