Italy tops 1 million infections since start of pandemic

By Giada Zampano

ROME - Italy on Wednesday reported 32,961 more cases of the novel coronavirus in the last 24 hours, surpassing one million total confirmed infections since the start of the pandemic.

The Italian Health Ministry also registered 623 more deaths since Tuesday, the highest single-day increase since early April, when the country was under a strict nationwide lockdown.

The new figures brought the national death toll to 42,953, as the Italian government struggles to keep a second wave of COVID-19 contagion under control.

According to the Health Ministry data, 225,640 swab tests were performed in the past 24 hours.

The northern Lombardy region, which includes Italy's financial capital Milan, remains the worst-hit area, with about 8,200 new daily cases and 152 new deaths.

The Italian government has been trying to avoid a second national lockdown -- which would have a heavy social and economic impact -- introducing different restrictions at a local level, based on the levels of contagion risk.

The new rules, which came into effect last Friday, divided the country into three color-coded risk areas with varying levels of closures.

But, many experts and scientists believe partial or "light" lockdown would not be enough to stop the constant rise in the curve of contagion seen recently.

Italy's national federation of doctors' guilds, FNOMCEO, has urged the government to put the entire country under lockdown, stressing that the situation was largely out of control, with hospitals overwhelmed with COVID-19 patients and increasingly unable to treat non-coronavirus patients.

"We are worried that the recent growth in the number of infections will pair with the arrival of the flu season in late December. That could cause a real implosion of Italy's national health system," FNOMCEO's president, Filippo Anelli, said on Wednesday during a web conference with the foreign press.

Earlier on Wednesday, however, Deputy Health Minister Pierpaolo Sileri had ruled out the option of a total lockdown as "highly unlikely."

The government is instead working on a plan that would impose tougher restrictions locally that would be enacted by regional governors and mayors in areas where new clusters have emerged.