Covid: 269 priests died in Italy in one year

Covid: 269 priests died in Italy in one year

I'm 269 i priests deaths due to Covid-19 in Italy in the first year of the pandemic. From March 1, 2020 to March 1, 2021, the diocesan clergy paid dearly for their closeness to the people, their presence in the environments most exposed to the virus and the fragility of an advanced age. The regions most affected were those in the North (78% of the total): leading the ranking is Lombardy with 88 deaths (33%). The contagion has almost eliminated the modest turnover guaranteed by new ordinations, which were 299 in 2020. If in 2019 the priests died were 742, in 2020 the total rose to 958 with an increase of 30%. This is what SIR wrote.

The most affected regions were those in the North (78% of the total): leading the ranking is Lombardy with 88 deaths (33%), Emilia Romagna with 36 (14%), Trentino Alto Adige with 28 (10%), Piedmont with 22 (8%) and Veneto with 17 (6%). Following - the CEI agency informs -, among the regions of the Center (11%) and the South (11%) with the highest number of victims, there are Marche with 15 dead priests (6%), Campania with 12 (4%) and Umbria with 7 (3%). The two islands total 14 deaths (10 in Sicily and 4 in Sardinia).

86 out of 225 dioceses (38%) have been affected by the contagion. Bergamo is the one that has paid the highest price in terms of deaths with 27 deceased priests. Then it is the turn of Milan and Brescia (18 deaths each), Trento (17), Bolzano (11), Cremona (9), Parma (8), Como (7), Padua (7), Piacenza (6), Lodi (6), Genoa (6), Reggio Emilia (6), Udine (6), and then the other dioceses. In Rome, for the clergy, one death from Covid is recorded.