ITALY COULD BE THE SAFEST COUNTRY WHERE TO PLAN HOLIDAYS
Covid-19
13/03/2020, 4th day of Quarantine, 2nd day of total closure of all activities as per Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte's new call to Italian residents.
All Italy is getting used to its new situation, and Italian residents are starting to see the positive sides of the new circumstances. #IOSTOACASA is the new motto that is sponsoring a not easy change of the whole everyday life routine. But from North to South Italy and islands a firm target is making this nation a one and only: health before economy.
Not easy for many little entrepreneurs to shut down their own shops, as this is their only everyday income, not easy for business owners nowadays to forecast the situation of the next months and decide what to do with the 3, 5, 10, 20, 100 employees, not easy for the Italian Government to assure the whole population under this uncertain circumstances and spread a climate of calm and trust. Therefore these are right now the main feelings pervading all Italy: calm and trust, together with a growing feeling of pride. We are sure more than ever that the Italian government has done all the necessary moves to protect the health and safety of the whole population, putting behind economic interests, but without forgetting them. Many new maneuvers will be enforced very soon to take the hits.
That said, right now Italy is the first European country facing this new invisible enemy and fighting it. Paradoxically, after China, Italy could be the safest country where to plan next months holidays as all necessary precautions are already in place, and nothing is left to chance.
While all European countries and the entire world, obviously under the same wind, are still deciding what to do, what to say to their citizens, and living their everyday life like nothing is happening, Italy is already in the fight, already forecasting the way out of it. Chances are that, in 5/6 weeks, it will be Italy that will select the countries to be in direct contact with and apply restrictions to whoever wants to enter the territory.
We have seen some yachting articles proposing holidays in North Europe avoiding the Med and overall avoiding Italy. We take the fair competition, where a country markets itself to attract more tourists, but blaming other countries that are facing a disaster is not exactly ethical, neither realistic in this moment. Apart from this, we are all positive, as scientists proved that the virus will have a hard time as the summer arrives, and also because each country will adopt soon the same process Italy has done and this will take the whole world out of this emergency.
Yachting regulation wise, the Italian maritime law is already on it, and all vessels approaching Italian coasts have to fill in a list of questionnaires and documents that will help Authorities to scan any possibility of virus on board. Realistically being on board with the whole normal safety procedures plus such security checks ashore make the whole idea of a trip in Italian waters the safest things to do for owners deciding their trip for the coming summer. We are ready to guide all our clients to follow the correct procedure and to fill in the necessary paperworks.
Coronavirus is bringing a new way to live, a new perspective, and most probably a forced stop that the whole universe was requiring. We will be happy to keep sharing our view, feelings and updated information with all our yachting community to help everybody read the situation from the inside of it.