'The sea is stormy and the captain is dancing on the deck.' One view of the US from Italy

For months, Italy has had the most coronavirus-related deaths of any country in the world, and Cremona, a province in Italy's north, has been particularly hard hit. Beppe Severgnini, a veteran Italian journalist and author, lives in the provincial capital, Crema, where he says he has become accustomed to the sound of ambulance sirens, almost as if he lived in New York.