Italy

It's probably a number of factors. The elderly make up a very high proportion of the population, they are very sociable and often have large family gatherings...and failure to test and isolate before it took hold.

Lots of charts and graphs here suziewoozie
www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

Older generation often sharing accommodation..
Consistent and methodical testing.
Interesting what Brendawymms says, sounds probable.

I read one article about the situation in Italy and it said that there were probably lots of cases which went undiagnosed early on - there were lots of cases of pneumonia amongst the elderly in December and January. The virus was spread to the health workers unwittingly, then spread to the wider community. They were a bit laissez-faire at the beginning too. But now they're not. I have friends who live near Verona and in Turin and Rome and I am worried about them. My friend who lives near Verona has colleagues who have lost their parents to this terrible killer.

Brendawymms is right, there are huge numbers of Chinese workers in Italy in the fashion business - not just leather but the sweat shops that make all our lovely designer clothes! If nothing else I suspect that this virus will make us look at the way we live in the future.

I read the same because there elderly are looked after by the families you have 3 generations in one home.

Is Italy's high rate also because so many of them are smokers?

brenda it is amazing what you learn on GN

The leather industry is strong in northern Italy but a lot of the businesses have been sold to Chinese nationals. A large number of Chinese also, apparently work in the factories in Northern Italy. Many went home to be with their families for the Chinese New Year and then returned to work in a Italy.
Some unknowingly bought the infection back with them.

Italy also is testing much more in the community - so their figures much higher. We aren’t testing not even medical staff. So no wonder low numbers. In Italy doctors and nurses are being tested every 2 days.

Thanks WW.A picture paints a thousand words ( and none of that include the idea of sending the virus ‘packing’)

www.wired.com/story/why-the-coronavirus-hit-italy-so-hard/

This adds a bit more

suzie I will try to get my son to send me something as he was wittering in about out trajectory at the beginning of the week. He was very alarmed, saying that he figures that unless the U.K. gets it’s act together PDQ we are in for a very rocky ride indeed.

I think its a combination of circumstances in Italy as well. They do have a high proportion of older people as Lucca said and they were initially slow to respond. The volunteers who are putting themselves on the front line deserve a medal.

Yes Granny it was leaked.

suzie thank you for that article that explains the mortality rate in Italy compared to other countries.

However it doesn’t appear to explain why so many are getting the virus in the first place, and I would still argue that stringent measures were not adopted sufficiently early enough.

Bloody DT paywall. What we need at the daily press briefings are more graphs. I realise we can’t have full figures on number of people who have contracted the disease but our death figures will be very reliable. I’d like to see a graph showing the deaths for UK and for Italy - we could then compare trajectories.

Riverwalk I believe the lockdown was compromised by a press leak and people fled from the two 'red' areas to the south in huge numbers.

www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-deaths-from-coronavirus-are-so-high-in-italy/

This is brief and clear. Yes River that item on C4 - and the people were volunteers. I am increasingly concerned a out what will happen here and at the attitude of some people - we could follow Italy.

I don’t want to alarm anyone, but this report must surely encourage people into lock down

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/03/19/coronavirus-deaths-rising-faster-uk-italy

I have close relatives in the red zone in Italy. They are describing it as being on a war footing. There are cases and fatalities in their small rural village. The local hospital is excellent and puts some of our to shame, yet it is totally overwhelmed with numbers on ventilators ( they have twice as many ventilators and icu beds as here). My relatives are fine so far but they are in total lockdown, they have stopped seeing family who they would normally see daily. There are people in their 40s in the village who are in hospital and one 45 year old has died. Doctors are also being treated in intensive care. Our laissez faire attitude and refusal to shut social venues is ridiculous. Supermarkets in Italy make people queue up 2 metres apart outside and only allow people in a few at a time, compare that to the undignified scrum here in our supermarkets. I am taking it seriously our local hospital here is already turning people away. Stay home people.

The death toll in Italy is staggering - it rose by over 400 each day for the past few days.

The piece on Channel 4 news last night was heartbreaking - many of the front line workers going into homes to help people, in full protective gear, were volunteers, not professionals.

And the sight of a convoy of military vehicles taking away the bodies was chilling.

From what I understand, the problem was contained in that northern area then they applied a lockdown, but not a proper one, so people from other regions or with family elsewhere fled and took the virus with them.

Italy has twice as many ITU beds as we do - just don't know how we will cope as this develops.

Gillybob with respect ....French, Spanish etc all,kiss , shake hands etc when they meet and actually (GD favourite word) so do Brits now.

Don’t forget that the chinese also live with their elderly parents. Very big on that.

Agreed wwm2 it looks as though here people won’t do the right thing until they HAVE to. Don’t get me wrong, normally I like our liberal tradition but this is so far removed from normal.