An elderly couple who were married for more than 60 years have died a couple of hours apart after contracting the coronavirus.
Severa Belotti, 82, and Luigi Carrara, 86, lived in the town of Albino, in the northern Italian province of Bergamo and reportedly spent eight days locked at home with a fever of 39 degrees.
They were eventually taken to Bergamo Hospital last weekend.
But their son Luca Carrara told local newspaper Corriere della Sera that they “died alone” in the facility as he was unable to say goodbye.
He said: “Your loved ones stay alone and you cannot say bye, hug them, trying to give some comfort."
The son wrote on social media: “Hi mum and dad, this bad virus made you leave the same day, will you keep bickering up there too? I think so, but then everything ended up in a hug."
Luca, who is currently in quarantine with his family, claimed staff at Bergamo Hospital did not know where to put patients.
He believes this was probably because doctors are doing a selection and letting the elderly people leave.
His father had no pre-existing medical conditions and was in good health before he caught the virus, Luca said.
"The truth is that this is not the common flu, it is a terrible flu and if you end up in hospital, you leave dead or alive," he added.
He was not able to see his parents’ bodies after their death because they were taken to the cemetery and will be cremated within days because of the scale of fatalities in Italy.
There have been 12,462 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the country, the most anywhere outside of mainland China, and 827 people have died.
