ROMA – There is a law, recovered in the Cesarini area and with some surprise, on ventilation systems and purification devices in Italian schools. The majority of Parliament, often accused of subordination to government activity, this time arrived where the Ministry of Education had not even tried and with a last-minute amendment to the Milleproroghe decree, voted in the House and Senate committees, has included in the “measures to contain the spread of the Covid-19 epidemic” a text that says: within thirty days, “by decree of the President of the Council of Ministers”, “the guidelines on the technical specifications must be defined. the adoption of mobile purification devices and fixed ventilation systems “.
Ventilation in just 200 schools, the lost opportunity against the virus
by Corrado Zunino
It is the controlled mechanical ventilation of which Republic he has spoken several times and for which a substantial scientific literature explains the ascertained effects of contrasting Covid. In Italy, the Marche Region funded it massively and, for the rest, mechanical ventilation was entrusted to a few enlightened school leaders and often lost between the intended use of government funding and the difficult relationship with local authorities owners of the walls of the institute: it is they who have to authorize the small building intervention to install the machines for ventilation, sanitation, and control of the carbon dioxide level.
The topic was bogged down in this limbo, but the Ideascuola Committee, 2,200 teachers, 30,000 families involved, engineers and physics professors to support them scientifically, managed to find an unexpected parliamentary path by asking the member Mila Spicola to write an amendment that the Democratic Party would bring to the parliamentary committees. The political-administrative steps were rapid and now the amendment is, together with the Milleproroghe decree, in the Official Gazette.
Ventilation at school, to beat Covid the recipe is simple but Italy insists on ignoring it
by Luca Ricolfi
The text talks about both classroom sanitation (now also sanitizers are included in the 350 million euro of the old decree) and guidelines on air quality at school. “It is a law that serves to bring order”, says Mila Spicola, “now the matter is in the hands of the government”. Any provision will have to be built by the Ministry of Health and subsequently passed to schools by the Ministry of Education. It has been estimated that only 1.5-2 billion euros would be needed for controlled ventilation, but so far the money available is that of the support decree. Local authorities can also use resources from the National Recovery and Resilience Plan for this purpose.
Professor Giorgio Buonannofull professor of Technical Physics at the University of Cassino, explains: “For a good application of the law we need a close comparison with the technicians, we give our availability”. Stefania Sambatarothe driving force of the committee, observes: “While the test measures within schools are falling, a provision is born that can become a pillar for the healthiness of Italian classrooms”.