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'Stay-at-Home' Order Stuns Italians as Some Question Enforcement

Jamie Dettmer

   The Italian government may turn to the army to buttress the police in
   enforcing a dramatic "stay-at-home" order imposed Monday by Prime
   Minister Giuseppe Conte to try to retard the spread of the coronavirus
   contagion.

   Announcing the decision in a televised address to the nation, Conte
   said limiting the movement of people throughout the country was
   absolutely essential. "I am going to sign a decree that can be
   summarized as follows: I stay at home," Conte said. "Travel must be
   avoided across the entire peninsula unless it is justified by
   professional reasons, by cases of need or for health reasons."

   He added, "We know how difficult it is to change our habits but there
   is no time." He said, "Our habits must be changed now. Today is our
   moment of responsibility. We cannot let our guard down ... Everyone
   needs to play their part."

   His move extends a quarantine, set up Sunday, which covered 16 million
   Italians living in the region of Lombardy and more than a dozen nearby
   provinces in the north of the country, where the virus first appeared
   in Italy in the village of Codogno on February 20.

   Since then, the number of confirmed cases has soared to 9,172 with 463
   of those infected succumbing to the virus. There's also rising concern
   in Italy about the death-to-cases ratio, which is running at 5 percent,
   much higher than other countries struggling with coronavirus.

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