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In Thomas Mann’s novel Death in Venice, the character Gustav von Aschenbach is not alarmed when he arrives with his wife in Venice by boat and encounters health inspectors questioning disembarking passengers. He begins to notice that more and more guests at the hotel he is staying are leaving. The hotel barber mentions something about a disease. Strolling through the city, watching the gondolas ahead of him, von Aschenbach smells the scent of germicide in the air and becomes increasingly curious about the medical secret. He finally learns the truth from an Englishman in a travel agency, who explains that Indian cholera, which originated in the “hot swamps of the Ganges delta,” has spread throughout the Mediterranean and has reached Venice, having already killed some people.
Venice, 1911: a virus imported from India. Beijing, Bergamo, Manhattan, Madrid, Cape Town, Jerusalem, Rabat, Venice, 2020: a virus made in China. The coronavirus has touched more than a million global citizens, including the British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Hollywood actor Tom Hanks, Prince Charles, football players, musicians, and has caused thousands of deaths with more to come. In Rome, on March 27, a crucifix, believed to have saved Rome from plague in the sixteenth century, was placed in front of St Peter’s Basilica and Pope Francis gave the Urbi et orbi address, usually reserved for the most solemn occasions. Via television, radio and social media, he addressed those in lockdown across the globe: “We find ourselves afraid and lost,” he said. The hour had come to “reawaken and put into practice that solidarity and hope capable of giving strength, support, and meaning to these hours when everything seems to be floundering.” The Pope deplored humanity’s errors and lack of faith: “We were not shaken awake by wars or injustice across the world, nor did we listen to the cry of the poor or of our ailing planet. We carried on regardless, thinking we would stay healthy in a world that was sick… Thick darkness has gathered over our squares, our streets, and our cities; it has taken over our lives, filling everything with a deafening silence and a distressing void, that stops everything as it passes by.”
Images of horror have spread around the world. Coffins lined up in an Italian church. Bodies in plastic bags shoveled by a forklift into a giant, refrigerated trailer parked at the Elmshurst hospital in New York. The USS Theodore Roosevelt, a US aircraft carrier, anchored at Guam, a hundred or more of its crew of 3500 infected by the virus, needing. The captain, who publicly pleaded for help from the Pentagon, was relieved of duty.
Just as the first large clusters of COVID 19 cases began to emerge in northern Italy, two migrants rescue ships—Ocean Viking and Sea Watch 3—docked at ports in eastern Sicily (on 23 and 27 February). The more than 450 rescued migrants were immediately put in quarantine in reception centers on land. The crew members were quarantined separately, on board their vessels. Gennaro Giudetti, a cultural mediator on board Sea Watch 3—which docked at the port of Messina in eastern Sicily—reported on a misconception among the new arrivals: “When we told the people we rescued that they would be quarantined on land, they thought it was a measure to protect them from the virus in Italy. Instead we believe it was because they feared that migrants could bring further contagions to Italy.”
“WE WANT OUR ISLAND BACK”
More than 42,000 refugees are trapped on overcrowded Greek islands in the Eastern Aegean, including Kos, Leros, Chios, Samos, and Lesbos. One reception center, Moria, prepared for 2840 asylum seekers, is holding more than 21,000. “Residents have cut down olive trees belonging to local villagers to build makeshift shelters covered with plastic sheets or for use as firewood. Water supplies and electricity are intermittent, and mounds of uncollected garbage are piled up in the camps entrance”. The UN Refugee Agency considers living conditions in the Reception and Identification Centers on Samos and Lesbos “abhorrent.” The municipalities on the small islands are overwhelmed and the locals are demonstrating against the growing number of foreigners. A banner on the Lesbos municipal theatre proclaimed: “We want our island back.” According to the BBC, many local people “feel abandoned” by their government. In an interview with CNN in early April the Greek Prime Minister claimed that no coronavirus infection had been reported on any of the islands, but if there was an outbreak, hardly any health service would be available, for locals or foreigners—just six intensive care units. The International Red Cross reported that 43% of the people living in the camps had contemplated suicide, a finding that for Imogen Sudbery, the International Rescue Committee’s Director of Policy and Advocacy, was “quite horrifying”. These people “have endured real horrors on their routes, but you would really hope that once they reached Europe they would be able to feel safe,” she said.
PAWN ON THE CHESSBOARD
Too often refugees are the pawns of international power players. By the end of 2018, the World Migration Report 2020 noted, there were 25.9 million refugees globally, with 20.4 million considered under the protection of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, and 5.5 million registered by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNWRA). There were also approximately 3.5 million people seeking international protection and awaiting determination of their refugee status. As in other years, the report summarized, “unresolved and renewed conflict dynamics in key countries contributed significantly to current figures and trends. Of the refugees under UNHCRs mandate at the end of 2018, the top ten countries of origin—Syrian Arab Republic, Afghanistan, South Sudan, Myanmar, Somalia, Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Central African Republic, Eritrea and Burundi—accounted for roughly 16.6 million, or 82 percent of the total refugee population… The ongoing conflict in the Syrian Arab Republic saw the number of refugees of that country reach approximately 6.7 million.” Today, 3.6 million Syrian refugees are surviving in Turkey, which receives from Brussels $6 billion to prevent Syrians from moving towards Europe.
For a few years, the Turkish deal with Brussels was relatively, solid. In March 2020, Ankara’s position changed. The Turks moved into Syria, supported militias fighting against the Assad regime. Tens of thousands of Syrians escaped towards Turkey, halted by troops at the border. Turkey’s president Recep Tayyip Erdogan asked for NATO support, and more money from Brussels for keeping the Syrians under control. Both demands were rejected. Without notifying the Europeans, Mr Erdogan told the Syrian refugees herded into his country that the gates were open; Europe was waiting for their arrival. Masses moved to the border, apparently enticed and encouraged with bus and train tickets provided by Erdogan aides. At the official border crossing, refugees were not received with flowers, but rubber bullets and tear gas. Foreign Policy writer Paul Hockenos witnessed “brutal, violent scenes, reminiscent of war zones.” The refugees were repulsed with military brutality, and Erdogan was paid more billions. The barbed-wire border halted the dreams of mothers and their babies, and mainly young men, dreaming of work. But such measures and risks are unlikely to stop migrant flows. A UN migration study, published in October 2019, showed that 93% of African migrants attempting the journey to European countries along irregular routes would do it again, despite facing often life-threatening danger.
P A R T II
24 HOURS WITHOUT ANSWER
In a tweet, SOS Mediterranée, the aid organization that with Médecins Sans Frontières runs the Ocean Viking rescue ship, declared it hoped the COVID-19 outbreak would not increase Italian anxieties about migrants and give politicians a pretext to prevent rescues. Sea Watch 3 and Ocean Viking, whose operations are suspended because of logistical difficulties related to the virus, were the last two NGO search and rescue vessels in operation in the Central Mediterranean, the most popular route from Libya to Italy. With most rescue ships out of action, there would likely be loss of more lives, predicted the independent, non-profit, news organization The New Humanitarian. There is also concern that COVID-19 could see more migrant vessels pushed back to Libya, which UNHCR has warned against because of the danger third-country nationals face on their forced return to Libya. One example: on February 28, a dinghy carrying 44 people called for rescue. After 24 hours without an answer, the boat was taken by the Libyan Coast Guard back to the shores of the North African nation.
Meanwhile, with almost all flights to and from Italy suspended, Mauro Palma, national ombudsman for the rights of detained people, expressed concern that Italy’s seven migrant repatriation centers could become health hazards. Palma warned that 425 migrants waiting to be repatriated—whose lives have been put on hold for weeks—are confined to an area where COVID-19 health guidelines, including safe social distancing measures, cannot be guaranteed, raising fears the virus will spread. There are similar concerns about ghettos in southern Italy’s agricultural fields, where vulnerable and exploited migrant workers often live in squalid conditions with little health protection. Courts are closed, so the government has suspended interviews for refugee status determination and hearings for appeals of asylum request denials. Employment help and legal assistance operations, those run by the Italian state and by NGOs, have been heavily reduced, while Italian language classes which are very popular and important for those trying to integrate, have been suspended until further notice.
NO MASKS BUT MONEY FOR MARS
From Bangladesh to Chile, from the Sahel to the Middle East, from Africa to Europe, announced Filippo Grandi, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, UNHCR and its partners are helping governments step up “preventive and preparatory measures for possible outbreaks of COVID 19, affecting refugees, displaced people and host communities.” The outlook is grim. Italy and Spain are suffering, despite modern, state-supported health systems. The United States, which spends yearly $700 billion on its military might, sending probes into deep space, and robots to mars, is struggling to contain the virus. It is late in testing, late in delivering ventilators for emergency procedures, has no masks in storage, and not enough beds to treat the suffering. The White House is using an emergency procedure allowing the president to force companies to manufacture materials in a national crisis, with, for example, the car manufacturer General Motors building ventilators. Military units are installing a 2500 bed COVID-19 hospital in an exhibition hall, a group of Christian churches opened a field hospital in New York’s Central Park, two giant military hospital ships docked in Los Angeles and New York, each with a 1000-bed capacity. Nurses and military doctors are assigned to duty, attempting to contain the virus.
“THIS IS SADLY A PERFECT STORM FOR COVID-19 TO TRANSMIT”
How can developing nations deal with the invisible enemy? Who is saving refugees, surviving in overcrowded camps all over the world NGOs distribute soap, but what happens then? “If we do nothing, the harm is going to be so extreme,” Paul Spiegel, a former senior UNHCR official and director of Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Humanitarian Health, told U.S. National Public Radio (NPR). Spiegel’s researchers have been examining for the United Nations how COVID-19 might affect refugee camps, particularly the densely populated camps outside Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh, which shelter the Rohingya population that escaped ethnic cleansing in Myanmar.
As of March 31, 49 cases had been reported in Bangladesh, with one infected person in Cox’s Bazar. Dr Spiegel though has no illusions. In these camps, outbreaks of diphtheria and measles were registered in the past, and the government of Bangladesh and international aid organizations distributed oral vaccines, since a cholera outbreak was expected and feared. The refugees “are packed together with incredible density,” so “when you think about disease transmission,” Spiegel told NPR, “this is sadly a perfect storm for COVID-19 to transmit.” Basic hospitals with an estimated 300 beds are available. If there is an outbreak, surrounding areas will be touched as well. Governments hosting refugee camps have to decide who has priority, the locals or the refugees. Spiegel is a realist: “Most would save their hospital beds and intensive care units, for their own citizens.” Can aid workers intervene, as witnessed in other countries, the NPR interviewer asked Dr. Spiegel. He thought it unlikely and said refugees need “A lot of protective gear, a lot more beds. They’re going to have to train healthcare workers. They need to figure out where to bury people. If we do nothing, the harm is going to be so extreme.”
SOAP AS SAVIOR
Libya, considered among the high-risk countries in the Middle East and North Africa, recently received emergency aid from UNHCR: four ambulances to be used in the poorer regions of the south. To boost hygiene, Syrian refugees in the Za’atari camp in Jordan are making and distributing soap. In Lebanon work is advancing on the construction of pilot isolation facilities in informal refugee camps in the Bekaa Valley. UNHCR also plans to expand intensive-care capacities at hospitals, for Lebanese and Syrians. For Uganda, which hosts more than 1.4 million refugees, the UN produced a video explaining how refugees can guard against COVID-19. No word of emergency wards or intubation procedures. An UNHCR airlift from Frankfurt, Germany, flew 4.4 tons of medical equipment, including masks, gloves and essential medicines to support the rather awkward COVID-19 response of Iran. Iran hosts close to one million Afghan refugees and faces critical shortages within its health care system. According to UNHCR In Bakhmut, Ukraine, at a community center for internally displaced Ukrainians in the Donetsk Oblast region, volunteers are using sewing machines donated by the UNCHR to produce face masks for local residents.
And now the good news: after a telephone discussion between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, the Russians delivered emergency medical supplies to the U.S., the most powerful nation on the planet. Robert Craft, owner of the New England Patriots American football team, sent his team jet to Beijing to pick up 1.2 million face masks for health workers in Massachusetts, New York, and Rhode Island. More will follow, most of them paid for by Craft. The UK government announced that it will not be evicting refugees and asylum seekers from temporary accommodation for the next three months, avoiding 50,000 people becoming homeless. And Portugal decided that all asylum seekers and migrants who have applied for residency will automatically receive residency status, allowing them access to healthcare and protection versus COVID-19. But in refugee camps, where no electricity or ventilators are available, soap is the only savior.
