Europeans fed up with restrictions
Continent grappling with measures to halt resurgence of COVID-19
MILAN — Italy braced Tuesday for more nationwide protests against virus-fighting measures such as regional curfews, evening shutdowns for restaurants and bars and the closures of gyms, swimming pools and theatres — a sign of growing discontent across Europe with renewed coronavirus restrictions.
Police in the financial capital of Milan arrested 28 people after protests turned violent on Monday night when police blocked their procession to the regional government headquarters. And in Italy’s industrial northern city of Turin, at least 11 people were arrested, including a pair who smashed the window of a Gucci boutique and stripped a mannequin of its lemon yellow trousers.
Italy is not the only country facing unrest. All of Europe is grappling with how to halt a fall resurgence of the virus before its hospitals become overwhelmed again.
Nightly curfews have been implemented in French cities and in Spain, and restaurants and bars in Italy must close at 6 p.m. Schools have been closed in Northern Ireland and the Czech Republic. German officials have ordered de-facto lockdowns in some areas near the Austrian border and new mask-wearing requirements are popping up weekly across the continent, including a nationwide requirement in Russia.
“We would all like to live like before, but there are moments where you have to make tough decisions,” French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said Tuesday as the government held emergency meetings on the pandemic.
Yet in this new round of restrictions, governments are finding a less compliant public, even as the continent has seen more than 250,000 confirmed deaths in the pandemic and last week recorded 46 per cent of the world’s new infections, according to the World Health Organization.
Over the weekend, police used pepper spray against protesters angry over new virus restrictions in Poland. Spanish doctors staged their first national walkout in 25 years on Tuesday to protest poor working conditions, and other protests were planned in the Netherlands.
In Britain, anger and frustration at the government’s uneven handling of the pandemic has erupted into a political crisis over the issue of hungry children. The Conservative government is under huge pressure to keep giving free school lunches to children from lower-income families when schools close during the current midterm break and the Christmas holidays.
France is warning of possible new lockdowns, including extending existing curfews, fully keeping residents at home on weekends or all week and closing non-essential businesses. Since curfews were imposed a couple of weeks ago, French police have issued 14,000 fines, the interior minister said Tuesday. Doctors are seeing growing pressure on France’s emergency services and intensive care wards, where COVID -19 patients now take up more than half of the beds.
In Spain, the Canary Islands was seeking to pass a law demanding that visitors arrive at the popular archipelago off northwest Africa with proof of a negative COVID-19 test.
Russia is resisting a second lockdown after most restrictions were lifted this summer. But with cases rising at over 15,000 a day, the health agency ordered all Russians to wear masks in crowded public spaces.