It all started with a phone call at 2:00 a.m. on February 21, 2020.

Suddenly it went from 2 ambulances to 9 ambulances: 24 hours, seven days a week. Every day up to 150 services!

We were literally overwhelmed by the emergency and had to drastically change so many procedures, both in our premises and in the ambulance, to ensure the safety of everyone.

At first we felt sucked into a whirlwind that blew us away. Then we realized the severity of the situation and we started to be afraid…

Yes it’s true, we volunteers were afraid, even though we took a thousand precautions. We were afraid for ourselves and for our beloved ones.
Unfortunately, we also had to take many people we knew to the hospital, people who would be left alone and scared, many of them perhaps feared never returning home…It was heartbreaking!
After the fear, the feeling of belonging to the Red Cross took over: we understood that our work was useful, indeed indispensable in that moment and the certainty that we were doing the right thing prevailed and this gave us even more strength and determination.

We have also been useful in other social areas, delivering medicines, helping people with shopping, bringing home meals, distributing clothing and food donated by generous citizens.
We offered assistance to the pets of those who were hospitalized.
We took care of the recovery of the personal effects of people who died in the hospital. In other words, we tried to always say yes to every request.

We were more than three hundred volunteers in the emergency period, we had chosen to be there in person and we are all still here. We do as best as we know how: stay close to people and, in our own small way, try to help them with all the commitment, generosity, and strength we have.
We of the Red Cross … we were there … and we will always be there!

This is our story told in pictures and taken in Lodi in the month of April.

Text by Lucia Fiorini, President of the Italian Red Cross – Committee of Lodi