Both Stefano and Elisa live among a disproportionately large elderly population most vulnerable to COVID-19.Elisa Spreafico is a 24-year-old student living in northeast Italy with her parents and brothers.
The pandemic has cast doubt over the couple's immediate future plans, but they do notice people around them are more generous than before.Instead, under some of the most severe restrictions on movement placed anywhere in Europe, Elisa Spreafico is separated from her boyfriend, Stefano De Palo, with more than 100 miles of Italian mountains, countryside and deserted roads in between them.
Elisa craves connections. She'll have to make do with Wi-Fi for now. It takes a three-hour drive from Stefano's apartment in the coastal town of Pietra Ligure, in a different municipality altogether, to reach her family home in the outskirts of Turin in northeast Italy. Today, Italian police can ask for certification for anyone in a vehicle, with cross-regional movement under severe restrictions since Prime Minister Guiseppe Conte banned all non-essential movement on March 10.
Unemployment and the long days in confinement away from his girlfriend and by himself sometimes take a toll on Stefano. Luckily, nature is all around him in Pietra Ligure, a sleepy town of approximately 9,000 people nestled against the Mediterranean Sea. The 29-year-old can almost see the crystal blue waters of the Mediterranean from his balcony.
The couple, shown in Florence, said that enforced separation in their own country has been difficult to overcome.Across the regional border, Elisa mimics his thoughts. She's noticed that the river near her has somehow turned blue during lockdown. Like so many of Italy's suburban areas, both Stefano and Elisa live among a disproportionately large elderly population most vulnerable to COVID-19. Stefano said a minority continue to defy lockdown, unable to relinquish old habits in a country famed for its social cohesion. For this reason, Stefano said he has strictly curtained his movements. He's left his apartment only three times in the 40 days, bulk buying food at his local supermarket.
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