ROME – Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi says he no longer has a fever or pain due to COVID-19’s “insidious illness” as he is returning to quarantine in one of his personal villas.
Berlusconi spoke by phone on Thursday with the leaders of his Forza Italia who were in Genoa campaigning for the upcoming regional elections in Italy.
Just a day earlier, the Italian media had quoted his doctor as saying Berlusconi had had the test but had no symptoms.Berlusconi will be 84 this month.
Berlusconi, a genuine real estate tycoon, had told his supporters that he would continue to cross for his small quarantined centre-right party on his estate near Milan.
“I have no more fever, I have no more pain, ” said Berlusconi.”I need to assure you that I am doing pretty well and that I continue to paint and that I will participate in any way imaginable in the existing election campaign.”
“It’s an insidious disease,” he added.
Voters in various parts of Italy voted for governor from 20 to 21 September.
Italy recorded only 1,400 new cases of coronavirus on Thursday, 71 more than the previous day’s increase.
Italy was the epicentre of the epidemic in Europe in February and March and saw another 35,500 people die in the pandemic, the highest time in Europe after Britain.Experts say all figures underestimate the true influence of the pandemic, due to the limited number of tests and other factors.
Many of those who recently tested positive in Italy have returned from popular destinations in the Mediterranean Sea, adding Sardinia, where groups of coronavirus infections have emerged.Berlusconi owns a villa across the sea on Sardinia’s emerald coast and spent part of his summer vacation there.
Among those who won Berlusconi’s graces for his welfare wishes was the governor of Lazio, the region that includes Rome.Nicola Zingaretti, of the rival Democratic Party, had COVID-19 at the start of the epidemic and recovered.
———
Track the AP pandemic in http://apnews.com/VirusOutbreak and https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak
Politics 24/7 of the latest news and events.