All of Italy goes into quarantine

Italy’s entire population of 60 million people have been placed in quarantine in a desperate attempt to halt the spiralling coronavirus epidemic.

Announcing the decision yesterday, the prime minister said that the shock measure would come into effect this morning, limiting the movement of people throughout the country. ‘‘We know how difficult it is to change our habits,’’ Giuseppe Conte said at a press conference, ‘‘but there is no time.’’

The move extends the quarantine zone set up on Monday, which covered 16 million Italians living in the region of Lombardy and 14 neighbouring provinces in the north where the virus began its spread in February.

National quarantine takes Italy beyond the shutdown of the Wuhan region in China, which affected 56 million people. Since the first person infected on Italian soil was identified in Codogno in Lombardy on February 20, the number of cases has soared to 9172, with a record one day jump of 1,797 yesterday, making Italy the worst-hit country outside Asia. The death toll climbed yesterday to 463, with 733 people in intensive care and 724 recovered, Italy’s civil protection agency said.

Conte also announced that all schools would close until April 3, after previously ordering them shut until March 15.

He said Italians would need to restrict their movements unless they have a pressing reason to travel. All open air assemblies of people would be banned, he added.

‘‘Our habits must be changed now,’’ he said. ‘‘I have decided to adopt a stronger method to counter the advance of the virus. There will be no zone 1 and 2, there will be Italy. Everyone needs to play their part.’’

Before he announced the new rules, Conte paraphrased Winston Churchill, saying: ‘‘It is our darkest hour but we will make it.’’

Rioting erupted in 27 prisons over the curtailing of visiting hours, and six inmates at Modena prison died after they broke into an infirmary and overdosed on methadone. During a protest at Foggia jail in Puglia 50 inmates escaped. Most were quickly recaptured.

After a fortnight in isolation, during which 50,000 residents stayed indoors and the infected were treated, police removed blockades from the 11 small towns in Lombardy and Veneto where clusters of the coronavirus were first identified last month.

‘‘We are now free to go into the new, larger red zone, but since we have contained the virus, we are actually safer staying here,’’ Francesco Passerini, the mayor of Codogno, said.

AP A beggar kneels on the pavement of a nearly desert via della Longaretta street in Trastevere area, a street normally crowded in the early evening, especially with tourist, in Rome.