WhatsApp messages exchanged between Italian politicians and top health officials at the start of the pandemic reveal how the leaders tried to protect the country's image after it became Europe's epicenter of Covid, while appearing to mock Italy's role in the spread of the virus.
The messages are part of the lawsuit by the families of the victims, which led prosecutors to place under investigation former Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, former Health Minister Roberto Speranza and 17 other officials suspected of being guilty of worsening the epidemic and murder, referring to the reaction of the government at the beginning of the pandemic.
Italy was the first European country to be hit hard by the coronavirus, with the first confirmed local case dated February 21, 2020 in Codogno, Lombardy. Several other European countries then reported their first cases, all related to infections in Italy.
However, in a WhatsApp message written on March 5, 2020, former health minister Roberto Speranza tells a colleague that "we must use" a report claiming that the first case of the coronavirus in Europe was detected in Germany to protect the image of Italy.
The next day, Giuseppe Ruocco, who at the time was secretary general at the Ministry of Health, mocked the cases detected in Europe among travelers returning from Italy. "Today we infected 2 people with Covid in Austria, 1 in France and 1 in Spain...and maybe 1 in Germany," he wrote.
The investigation was launched by prosecutors in Bergamo, the province of Lombardy most affected by the first wave of the pandemic. Bergamo recorded 6,000 deaths during the first wave of the virus, and prosecutors say 4,000 could have been prevented if Bergamo had been quarantined immediately.
In other messages, it is read that two regional health officials, Aida Andreassi and Marco Salmoiraghi, talk about the efforts of politicians to hide the truth of the situation at the time. Do you know what the [Lombardy] president said?" Andreassi wrote. "You can't tell the truth. I said, 'Well, it's like we're in China.' He replied that we are worse than China – at least there is a dictatorship there.”
Another element of the investigation is the lack of an up-to-date national plan regarding pandemics. Italy's last plan dates back to 2006.
All the data have been presented to a judge, who will decide whether or not to send them to trial.
