Italian Covid victims’ families claim compensation from government

Court in Rome hears lawyers say authorities moved too little, too late to tackle pandemic

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A case brought by more than 500 families of Covid victims seeking a total of 100m in compensation from the Italian government has reached court, as the first hearing into continental Europe's deadliest outbreak got under way in Rome.

Lawyers representing the relatives of coronavirus victims filed a dossier of more than 2,000 pages on Thursday containing hundreds of testimonies and evidence of systemic negligence" by the Italian authorities, which allegedly caused the deaths of thousands of people.