Coronavirus, twelve missionaries died in Parma in a few days
It tells of the dead, of isolation, of “zero contacts with the outside, so as not to put young people and others at risk”. Even the external staff, in the Parma office, is gone. “We are alone, all closed here. Food comes to us from a trolley-lift. We eat two meters away from each other. We pray. We get sick and die. But now someone has to come and help us.”
Because in addition to the dead there are also a dozen sick people. “About six downstairs from where I am now, and then five more I think. No one has swabbed in here, ever. We are halving. I can’t say, which is the coronavirus. But what do you want it to be? There is no oxygen, they don’t breathe. No one has tested here. ”
Explain that everything “started about then days ago: the first ailments, then the first priests who started to die. With us, who will be fifty missionaries here, if we exclude the staff, there are usually 4-5 deaths a year, at most 6. Now we are thirteen in a few days, I don’t know what to say. Almost all of them died here, only a couple in the hospital “he explains in a broken voice.
Among the last to leave, Father Stefano Coronese (88 years old), who has always been close to the world of scouts and Father Gerardo Caglioni (73 years old), known for his missions in Mexico and Sierra Leone. Before them, we read in the long list on the website of the Xaverians, farewell to father Luigi Masseroni, Giuseppe Scintu, Gugliemo Saderi, Giuseppe Rizzi, Piermario Tassi, Vittorio Ferrari, Enrico Di Nicolò, Corrado Stradiotto, Pilade Giuseppe Rossini, Nicola Masi and others yet.
All priests who spent their lives in the most distant places in the world to bring comfort and then returned to Parma, to the large headquarters, “to continue their lives. The average age of the Xaverians is 75 years – says Father Rosario – many of they had come here after traveling for forty, even fifty years. And now they are gone like that, in the silence of the rooms. ”
Silence was from the beginning, more than two weeks ago. In fact, after the first deaths, the Xaverians say they sensed that something was wrong. So the service staff was sent home. There is also a “perhaps coronavirus positive” nurse. No more chefs, assistants, cleaning and laundry workers or the staff of the offices of the foreign missions: all the “employees” of the office were no longer allowed to enter, even because of the decrees.
“We closed everything and we closed ourselves in”. So there was created, between the corridors and rooms, a “lazaretto” with practically no doctors, “apart from one of us, a missionary who made 25 years in Bangladesh”. A trolley-lift with food cooked by a catering company brought up food.
“For the rest, we have arranged between ourselves, but the situation has worsened. Now we need help, someone to come. We have also written to the mayor, told the authorities. We need a timely intervention, come and reclaim, because here it is clear that the virus circulates. ”
Explain that for a few days, having not yet seen “no one who showed up here to help us, even if a doctor then came, we decided to speak to the media, to say what is happening. You too tell us that we need a hand. We don’t move from here. There are 15 seminary boys outside, theology students: we don’t want to run the risk of meeting them, infecting them. But we need someone who comes to heal us, to save us, “they confess the last soul saviors left in the venue.
