Coronavirus crisis has killed 37 doctors in Italy, while more than 6,000 medical workers have been infected, it emerged today.
Three more doctors died of coronavirus yesterday, in Bergamo, Foggia and Naples, the Italian Federation of Medical Professionals said, bringing the total to 37.
The head of an Italian research institute said today that 6,205 health workers had caught the disease – 8.3 percent of Italy’s 74,376 total infections.
‘What we face every day is a real war bulletin. Doctors and their families mourn their dead,’ said Filippo Anelli, president of the doctors’ federation.
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The doctors’ federation has warned that the true death toll may be higher because ‘many doctors die suddenly, even if the cause of death is not directly attributable to the virus because the swab is not carried out.’
On top of that, at least one nurse is believed to have killed herself after being infected with coronavirus and fearing she had spread the disease to others.
Daniela Trezzi, 34, had been working on the front line of the coronavirus crisis at a hospital in Lombardy, the worst-affected region of Italy.
The National Federation of Nurses of Italy confirmed her death and expressed its ‘pain and dismay’ in a statement earlier this week.
The nursing group also revealed that ‘a similar episode had happened a week ago in Venice, with the same underlying reasons’.
‘Each of us has chosen this profession for good and, unfortunately, also for bad: we are nurses,’ the federation said.
‘The condition and stress to which our professionals are subjected are under the eyes of all.’
Many Italian hospitals have been overwhelmed by the scale of the crisis and are facing shortages of ventilators and other medical supplies.
Thousands of medics falling sick has taken them away from the front line when they are desperately needed.
Nino Cartabellotta, the head of the Gimbe foundation which is gathering data on the number of infected medics, urged that this ‘phenomenon’ must be ‘curbed to safeguard those who take care of us’.
As well as hospital doctors and general practitioners, the dead include dentists, psychiatrists and an ophthalmologist.
