Passengers arriving at Italian
airports from China have so far shown no new COVID-19 variants
since testing became mandatory amid a virus surge in the Asian
country two days ago, Health Minister Orazio Schillaci said
Friday.
"The goal is to sequence the results of the positive samples to
check whether in the passengers arriving from China there are
variants of the sarsCoV2 virus other than the known ones.
"So far we are absolutely reassured because all the cases
sampled prove that they are all variants of Omicron already
present in our national territory", said Schillaci on 'Oggi è un
altro giorno' on Rai Uno, stressing that "in the first flights
arriving at Malpensa from China one out of every two passengers
was positive, while in the flights that arrived at Fiumicino the
percentage fell to between 10 and 20%".
Schillaci added that the ministry might recommend using face
masks in Italy again if cases rise sufficiently.
"If there is an increase in cases we could again recommend the
use of masks indoors, but today we are not in this situation
because the data are down and we are in a situation of serene
tranquillity; however, we continue to be vigilant and now we
focus on the responsibility of citizens" .
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