Pain, anger and hope, the toll of the COVID-19 pandemic in Bergamo

Pain, anger and hope, the toll of the COVID-19 pandemic in Bergamo

In March 2020, the main hospital in Bergamo in the Lombardy region of Italy became the European epi-centre for an unfolding pandemic.In some places around Bergamo, COVID-19 took more lives in three weeks than in the whole of 2019. This heavy death toll has left many scars still visible to this day.Matteo Cella has been a priest for 10 years in Nembro, one of Bergamo's hardest-hit municipalities. Between March and April 2020 almost 2% of the population there died. Father Cella's evening services now often turn to remembrance for those taken by the virus.He says that it's not all about statistics, behind the numbers are people, people special to communities. He remembers a 58-year-old midwife and active volunteer at his parish. He recounts how well known she was and how eager she was to assist mothers in need. She cared for her mother who got sick with COVID-19 and died. She herself died shortly after from the same illness, just weeks after becoming a grandma.At the start of 2020, the mortality rate in Bergamo rose by 400% compared to the previous year. Church bells stopped announcing the deaths of parishioners; they had become a source of anxiety and fear.Funeral homes