But for all the kindhearted compassion this virus has inspired, there are at least as many troubling signs that as the pandemic subsides, the worst could be yet to come. Police in the southern province of Puglia say that a food delivery truck was hijacked on the main highway near the port town of Bari last week, Bari police confirmed to CNN.
The driver was unharmed, but when the truck was found, every single item was gone. Many grocery stores now have security guards out front when new merchandise is unloaded to stop people from running up to grab basic supplies like boxes of pasta and cans of tomatoes.
A few days after the Puglia hijacking, police were called after 20 people filled their carts at a Lidl supermarket in Palermo on the island of Sicily, and refused to pay. Col. Michele Monti responded to the call and told CNN that while he viewed it as an "isolated incident" the message was clear. "If this situation continues without the help of the government, we won't be able to feed our children," he said. "It was a message that they wanted to be understood."
The incident ended peacefully. "It wasn't violent, and the 20 people filled their carts said they didn't want to pay so we intervened and they calmly left without the food," Monti told CNN. "We here in Palermo also activated ourselves after this. We knew that many people, for their own dignity, wouldn't have asked for help but would need it. We know that a lot of this need was being hidden, so it was our initiative to support everyone." They have prepared care packages, left food at door steps and made sure high-risk people have medicine they need so they don't have to leave their homes.
