Good Covid-19 News from Italy and Sweden

Interestingly, the perspective from an Italian citizen (myself) is quite different.

- The media does not mention success anywhere: they only scream loud where positive people are found, regardless of trends

- Relaxing rules about train occupancy for long-haul trains (currently forced at 50% capacity) was bound to happen last weekend. However, the health minister reversed the decision mere hours before it went into effect. Train companies, which had been preparing for the change in the past 15 days (including negotiating protocols) were forced to refund thousands of tickets

- The shutdown was unnecessarily harsh, there is still no clear evidence (aside modeling, so lots of caveats apply) that deaths were spared by the lockdown, and the economy was hit pretty hard

- The Italian government is also one which did the least to mitigate the economic damage of the lockdown, a clear contrast with its public statements ("we will", "we plan", etc.)

- Schools were never reopened, talks about the "safety" in schools are reaching honestly hard to believe proposals (like wheeled desks). One month or so left before reopening them, there is no policy nor clear indication on what to do.

- Government models on the epidemic were completely off: the worst-case scenario predicted 150,000 Italians needing ICU care by the end of June, and while it was widely publicized, the actual report was secret, was somehow leaked around, and was full of large epidemiological errors

- A state of emergency was continued despite the absence of one (ICU use and hospitalization are in the lower figures)

- Thousands of people that recovered are still being held by the fact that they require two consecutive negative tests, and sometimes the delays are up to months

- Italy voted with Europe in allowing certain countries to enter the Schengen area with no quarantine, yet immediately reversed the decision locally, forbidding anyone from entering without "proper reasons" and with a quarantine of 14 days. At the same time, "special flights" carrying citizens from Bangladesh arrived without quarantining (I'm guessing it was part of some agreement on workers), and guess what, some of those people tested positive afterwards

- There's quite a lot of debate on how to consider a person positive to the test. At this point, people positive to IgG tests are counted as having the virus (however, evidence shows that IgG appear at least one week after symptom onset and peak much later, hence these people are not infectious)

- The scientific committee often makes "threats" to the population in case the advice isn't followed, despite having no authority to do so (that belongs to the government: they are only advisors).