The health ministry did not have a pandemic plan on February 7. Shame!
What Agostino Miozzo, coordinator of the Technical Scientific Committee (Cts) that is managing the Covid emergency, revealed on the pandemic plan (which Italy did not have) against the coronavirus. All the details
Question: "Was there a general pandemic plan on February 7, the first meeting of the CTS?".
Answer: “No, and this was the great weakness of the Ministry of Health. There was no provision for necessary masks, beds to free. Above all, there were no stocks. The country started from scratch and we, from scratch, had to quickly prepare an anti-Covid plan to be used immediately "
The question was asked today by a journalist from the newspaper Repubblica to Agostino Miozzo , coordinator of the Technical Scientific Committee (Cts) which is managing the Covid emergency.
The answer of one of the leading exponents of the CTS places a definitive point on a story that saw the Rai Report program the protagonist of in-depth studies on this very theme: Italy did not have, when Sars-Cov-2 broke out and therefore the pandemic , a pandemic plan to tackle the coronavirus.
Miozzo has revealed even more.
Repubblica asked: why for weeks have you insisted on indicating tampons only for those with symptoms?
The CTS coordinator replied: «There were no reagents, one of those things that a pandemic plan should have foreseen. Limiting the tampons was an obligatory choice ».
There weren't even the masks: 'Nothing. One Ffp2, one surgical. To cry. In mid-March I invented community masks. I wanted to preserve the professional devices for doctors and nurses and I started saying: let's put on a headband, a scarf, a foulard », added Miozzo.
Finally, the question of Alzano and Nembro: “I understand Conte. Closing that area meant stopping an economic lung of the country. Maybe we would have saved some lives, but it is easy to pronounce in hindsight ”.
Now let's see below to give some main elements of the pandemic plan that the Ministry of Health had not updated and the role of Ranieri Guerra.
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RECONSTRUCTION OF THE DAILY FACT, EXTRACT OF AN ARTICLE
Italy, as revealed in March by the Fact , had a pandemic plan. It is a document that has been compiled by the countries adhering to the World Health Organization since the avian flu epidemic in 2003 and reports the actions and countermeasures to be implemented in the event of large-scale epidemic events. "It – reads the website of the Ministry of Health – represents the national reference on the basis of which the regional operational plans will be developed" and the WHO "recommended" to all states "to constantly update it following agreed guidelines" . On this side of the Alps the task lies with the Prevention Department of the ministry. Between 2014 and 2017, Report told in yesterday's episode, he was led by Ranieri Guerra, now deputy director of the WHO and at the beginning of March sent to Rome at the behest of the director general Tedros Adhamon Ghebreyesus in support of the government against the Covid-19 emergency. Under his direction, the Plans have not been updated nor have the health authorities thought about stocking up masks and other DPIs to deal with the epidemic.
When asked about the subject, says Siegfried Ranucci's program, Guerra prefers not to answer. He does not even do so when Serena Bortone during the episode of Agorà on March 31 points out to him that "the Italian pandemic plan has not been updated since 2010". "This is not the case – the professor scoffs – there are levels of confidentiality that must be respected". Then joined by the reporter of Report Giulio Valesini, the WHO exponent unloads everything on who came after him: "I don't know anything about what the Italian government has done in the last three years". But did you know or not that Italy had not stocked masks and was not ready for the pandemic plans? "I don't know, I'm not part of the government." It is not, but the pandemic plan has been at a standstill since 2010 and between 2014 and 2017 he was the man sent to Rome by the general manager Ghebreyesus to lead the Lungotevere Ripa Department that should have updated it.
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FROM THE RAI WEBSITE : a reconstruction of Report 's work on the pandemic plan of Italy with the War version
COPY AND PASTE
by Giulio Valesini and Cataldo Ciccolella
GIULIO VALESINI OFF SCREEN
Ranieri Guerra on March 31, the day after our episode where he had already declined the invitation, participates in the Agorà program and is cornered by his colleague Serena Bortone.
- FROM AGORÀ DATED 31/03/2020
SERENA BORTONE
Report yesterday says that the Italian pandemic plan has not been updated since 2010, you Professor Guerra was until 2017 director general for preventive health of the Ministry of Health, so in some way she was also responsible for this pandemic plan, it is true that not have you updated since 2010?
RANIERI GUERRA – ADDITIONAL DIRECTOR OF THE WORLD ORGANIZATION
OF HEALTH
Not so, Report can say what he wants but he knows, there are also levels of confidentiality that must be respected.
GIULIO VALESINI OFF SCREEN
Ranieri Guerra does not respond to his responsibilities for the failure to apply the pandemic plan, he raises a smokescreen and evokes secret plans that have nothing to do with the anti-pandemic ones.
FROM AGORÀ DATED 31/03/2020
SERENA BORTONE
Excuse me I translate, confidentiality means that there was a non-public plan but you had?
RANIERI GUERRA – ADDITIONAL DIRECTOR OF THE WORLD ORGANIZATION
OF HEALTH
There are courses of action that are activated when an epidemic of this type erupts.
SERENA BORTONE
Which are not published, but which you have anyway.
RANIERI GUERRA – ADDITIONAL DIRECTOR OF THE WORLD ORGANIZATION
OF HEALTH
They are partially published, they are published for what concerns the activation of peripheral administrations.
GIULIO VALESINI OFF SCREEN
We looked for Ranieri Guerra because he was the Director General for Prevention of the Ministry of Health between 2014 and 2017. It was he who should have followed the update of the national pandemic plan. Responsibility shared with his successor Claudio D'Amario, but he too preferred not to talk to us. As director of the CCM, Ranieri Guerra should also have coordinated the regions so that they made their own plan against pandemics and stocked up on masks to protect doctors, nurses and the most vulnerable.
GIULIO VALESINI
I just wanted to know if Report deserved ten minutes of his attention out of respect for our viewers too, well, that's all.
RANIERI GUERRA – ADDITIONAL DIRECTOR OF THE WORLD ORGANIZATION
OF HEALTH
You are insisting in a truly heartbreaking way.
GIULIO VALESINI
The question is very simple: did you or did you not know that Italy had not stocked masks and was not ready for the pandemic plans?
RANIERI GUERRA – ADDITIONAL DIRECTOR OF THE WORLD ORGANIZATION
OF HEALTH
I don't know, I don't have the faintest idea because I'm not part of the Italian government.
GIULIO VALESINI
In three years, what have you done with respect to the updates of the pandemic plans? We have consulted all the Italian regions, there are pandemic plans even from 2006, from 2007. Our last valid pandemic plan is from 2010. You have been a director of this Ministry for three years, you say “He asks me questions that don't nothing enters ". I think she must have known.
RANIERI GUERRA – ADDITIONAL DIRECTOR OF THE WORLD ORGANIZATION
OF HEALTH
Please, please ask the Italian Government for things concerning the Italian Government, because you are asking me, I am from another administration.
GIULIO VALESINI
You who have been a senior executive in our Ministry for years, why did you not say to the Government in January “Buy masks, convert production, we're in bad shape”? She knew it.
RANIERI GUERRA – ADDITIONAL DIRECTOR OF THE WORLD ORGANIZATION
OF HEALTH
No, I didn't know; are you kidding? I've been in another administration for three years.
SIGFRIDO RANUCCI IN THE STUDIO
The former director of prevention of our Ministry of Health, at least until 2017 today deputy director at the World Health Organization, Ranieri Guerra, did not want to speak with us on the broadcast, he preferred to leave a comment on our Facebook page. This on the very evening of the broadcast, he accused us of being unfair, of having also said nonsense, of having omitted that he had left a pandemic plan updated to 15 December 2016 and also linked the document on the site. of the Ministry of Health. In short, we have checked, we went to see what was in that link and we must admit that we were wrong, in short, we were wrong but due to an excess of optimism, the plan was not even in 2010. Our Giulio Valesini and Cataldo Ciccolella.
GIULIO VALESINI
The page that Ranieri Guerra pointed out to us in a warning and posted on Facebook to comment on our investigation, we had it analyzed by Claudio Agosti: a software developer and researcher affiliated with the University of Amsterdam. His specialty is web data tracking and cyber security
CLAUDIO AGOSTI – RESEARCHER UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM
Thanks to a tool called the "Wayback machine" …
GIULIO VALESINI
… A kind of internet time machine.
CLAUDIO AGOSTI – RESEARCHER UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM
Exactly. This here is the site we use to consult the page that Ranieri Guerra pointed out to us and we will look at how long this page was present. Thanks to an analysis mechanism called "metadata analysis", we can see when this pdf was generated.
GIULIO VALESINI
A kind of identity card of the document.
CLAUDIO AGOSTI – RESEARCHER UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM
Yes, yes … And we discover that the file dates back to 2006, and that even in previous versions of the Ministry of Health there was always a link that pointed to the same file. And, going back in time, we discover that this is the first …
GIULIO VALESINI
… The first time it appeared, let's say.
CLAUDIO AGOSTI – RESEARCHER UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM
Yes, that's right, the first time the automatic archive system looked at it was in 2006. And the file is still the same. Here, here we have made a history of copies of this plan: 2011, 2015, 2017,
2020. Yet, the cryptographic computation, called "checksum", shows that it is the same file down to the last bit. It has never changed.
GIULIO VALESINI
Even the pandemic plan, the official one of 2010, is always the same as in 2006, then?
CLAUDIO AGOSTI – RESEARCHER UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM
It is identical from 2006 until now.
GIULIO VALESINI
That is, we have been making a copy-paste for 14 years.
CLAUDIO AGOSTI – RESEARCHER UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM
What changes is only the page that links it. But the linked file is always the same.
GIULIO VALESINI
But is it true that there are even time references written in the file?
GIULIO VALESINI
And it is written that the first stock of drugs, equal to 170 thousand cycles of antivirals "already established at the Ministry of Health", this "stock will be completed by 2006". We are in 2020, so …
CLAUDIO AGOSTI – RESEARCHER UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM
Yes. This is an example of the pandemic plan never being updated and still speaks of a bygone era.
PIERPAOLO SILERI – Deputy Minister of Health
We have a pandemic plan that is undoubtedly, I would say, "vintage", to say a delicate word.
GIULIO VALESINI
So we basically made fun of the international communities too. ECDC, on its website, says that Italy updated a pandemic plan in 2010. That's not true, Minister.
PIERPAOLO SILERI – Deputy Minister of Health
If I had been here in 2006, 2009, 2014, here I would not have done it. Today we have more than 30 thousand dead, it is time to no longer be able to throw the dust under the carpet.
GIULIO VALESINI OFF SCREEN
Instead, someone within the ministry continued to hide it, dust under the carpet. Deputy Minister Sileri was given a fresh fresh draft of the new pandemic plan, but I only delivered it the day after our first interview.
CLAUDIO AGOSTI – RESEARCHER UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM
Analyzing this pdf file you can see that it was modified and created on 5, that is, on May 6, 2020.
CLAUDIO VALESINI
So it's very recent, after the outbreak of the actual pandemic …
CLAUDIO AGOSTI – RESEARCHER UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM
Yes. Sure sure, it's this launch.
PIERPAOLO SILERI – Deputy Minister of Health
This is the only version that is a draft …
GIULIO VALESINI
This is the only one that differs from 2006.
PIERPAOLO SILERI – Deputy Minister of Health
It is a draft.
GIULIO VALESINI
It is a draft, in fact.
PIERPAOLO SILERI – Deputy Minister of Health
I asked everything there is on the pandemic plan, I am not saying from the first day that we discovered Covid but, in short, a few days later …
GIULIO VALESINI
So, let's say, in two months they gave you this draft.
PIERPAOLO SILERI – Deputy Minister of Health
It will be from February, March … let's say from March, that's it.
GIULIO VALESINI
Here, however, is the fact that you, who are the deputy minister, asked for all the documentation on the pandemic plan in March …
PIERPAOLO SILERI – Deputy Minister of Health
Look, I'll tell you one for all: do you know when I learned about the two Chinese patients who were positive?
GIULIO VALESINI
Well… I guess right away.
PIERPAOLO SILERI – Deputy Minister of Health
No. From television, like most Italian citizens. And, indeed, my wife saw it and said to me: “But, what are you doing? There are two Chinese in Rome, positive, and you go home and don't tell me anything? ”. I said: “Look, I didn't know anything about it, I knew it now with you”.
GIULIO VALESINI OFF SCREEN
The plan that the ministry pretended to update for years provided for concrete prevention measures in defense of doctors on the front line against the virus. Among the many, the storage of personal protective equipment, diagnostic kits and the training of medical personnel. All things to do before a pandemic breaks out. In Italy, about 100 doctors and nurses died in the field due to Covid-19. In Bergamo, they paid a very high bill for the unpreparedness and failure to implement the pandemic plan.
GIULIO VALESINI
As a doctor, as well as a citizen, what effect does it have on you to know that we have an old pandemic plan… what does it remind you of?
GUIDO MARINONI – PRESIDENT OF THE ORDER OF DOCTORS OF BERGAMO
It makes me think that we all have a bit of a fault, a country has the political class it deserves and expresses itself. I think that what happened must really make us change the way we think and set problems.
PIERPAOLO SILERI – Deputy Minister of Health
I think that if I am wrong in the hospital the patient will not forgive me. Whoever made a mistake here, in my opinion, if the mistake is acknowledged, he must resign.
SIGFRIDO RANUCCI IN THE STUDIO
More than one should resign. That plan hadn't even been updated in 2010 but it was a clumsy copy paste of the 2006 one. Clumsy because then they also left the dates. Who is that official, those officials who have operated in this copy paste showing superficiality towards the protection of the health of Italians, superficiality in protecting the health of doctors, health workers, nurses, the most fragile, the police . Here and it is never possible that they have shown so little respect for the institution they represent, very important in our country which is the Ministry of Health. And it is possible that that institution did not check, because that copy and paste plan also ended up on the tables of international organizations. On a story like this, a Ministry of Health can lose face just as it makes the country it represents lose it. Here we believe that the time has come for Minister Roberto Speranza to make his voice heard clearly and loudly on this matter.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/ministero-salute-piano-anti-pandemia-il-7-febbraio-parola-di-cts/ on Sun, 06 Sep 2020 08:50:36 +0000.