Italy has tightened corona restrictions in several regions due to the rising number of infections. Many schools will close again from Monday, and restaurants in the affected areas will no longer receive guests.
The southern Italian holiday region of Campania, which includes Naples and the Amalfi coast, is the third region in the country of 60 million inhabitants to be designated a red zone by the Ministry of Health. Previously, Basilicata in the south and the small Adriatic region of Molise have been labelled as such. In these areas, all schools are closed, and people have to stay at home as much as possible.
Since the autumn of 2020, the Italian government has divided regions into different coloured risk zones to fight against the pandemic.
On Monday, other areas, such as Veneto in the north, were upgraded to orange zones due to rising infection levels. Neighboring Lombardy, home to about 10 million people, already belongs to this middle-risk zone. The same goes for Tuscany and Umbria.
There is still a curfew from 10 pm throughout Italy, and regional borders may only be crossed in exceptional cases.
Since the start of the pandemic, more than three million Italians have been infected with the coronavirus; about 100,000 of them have not survived the infection. After Great Britain, where about 125,000 people have died from the virus, Italy has the highest number of corona deaths in Europe.