The Guardian view on Italy’s lockdown: no storybook endings | Editorial

After nine weeks of confinement, Italians are back in the streets. But the most difficult decisions have yet to be made

We are living in the night of the virus," wrote one academic, soon after Europe's first Covid-19 lockdown was imposed in Italy. Living in the dark, because it's difficult to see what's happening out there, since we are shut up in our homes."

On Monday Italians entered blinking into the light again, after nine weeks of more or less total confinement, enforced by a combination of fines and moral exhortation. As the prime minister, Giuseppe Conte, begins tentatively to reopen the economy, the employees of Ferrari and Lamborghini are returning to their factories, along with other workers in the manufacturing and construction industries. Shops will open in two weeks' time; bars and hairdressers in June. Italians are able to exercise freely at last, stroll through late spring sunshine and visit relatives.