Italy: People ready to face COVID-19 second wave

Rome: Almost 84 percent of people in Italy say they are prepared for a new health emergency, while 80 percent support the new rules making masks mandatory at all times in public.

A new survey by Censis found that 83.7 percent of people in Italy feel “prepared” to face a second wave of Covid-19 as the number of new cases continues to rise in the country.

The majority are “ready to face the health emergency and the restrictions they have been preparing for for some time,” wrote the authors of the Censis-Eudaimon report titled “Working during and after Covid-19”.

“Italians have prepared themselves psychologically and materially for the second wave, including within businesses,” the report states.

However, fewer are confident that authorities are equally well-prepared for a new emergency phase.

Just over 55 percent said they think the Italian government is ready to deal with a second wave.

An average of 66 percent said their regional authority is prepared (the figure was highest in the North-East at 83.2%, but drops to 65.1% in the south and islands.)

Just over 63 percent of employees surveyed said they felt their company was adequately prepared.

The survey also found that the vast majority in Italy agree with the new obligation to wear a mask everywhere outside the house.

Overall, 80 percent said they were in favour of new rules requiring a face mask to be worn in all public places, indoors and outdoors, including at work (which was not previously the case in Italy except in public-facing roles) with fines of up to 1,000 euros for non-compliance.

The figure rose to 86 percent among women, and the measure appears more popular in the south (83.1%) than the north-west (78%) and north-east (71.6%).

Three out of four employees said they were in favour of masks being mandatory at work. The highest levels of support for the measure were among executives (84.2%) and graduates (80.7%).

Some 24 percent of employees have worked remotely for the first time due to the pandemic. 41 percent said remote working had improved their work-life balance, while 13 percent said things were easier when they could go into the office.

Around half of those surveyed think the way people work in Italy has changed forever.