SOAVE – With warmer weather beckoning, Italians are straining against a strict lockdown to halt the coronavirus that is just now showing signs of ebbing at the end of five weeks of mass isolation.
Italy was the first Western democracy to be hit by the virus, and it has suffered the most deaths of any nation: nearly 19,000.
Now it is likely to set an example of how to lift broad restrictions that have imposed the harshest peacetime limits on personal freedom and shut down all nonessential industry.
Right now, schools are closed and children are not permitted to play in parks. Walks outdoors are limited to a distance of 200 meters (yards) and any excursion not strictly a matter of necessity risks hefty fines.