Genova. Sono sette le morti sospette che da sabato a oggi potrebbero essere attribuite al caldo insopportabile che sta caratterizzando questo inizio di agosto. Dopo la donna di 47 anni e l’anziana di Rossiglione morte sabato, tra ieri e questa mattina ci sono stati altri 5 decessi sospetti.

Ieri una donna di 95 anni è morta nella sua abitazione di via Bologna. Sul posto sono intervenute le volanti della polizia.

E sempre ieri un uomo di 46 anni ha chiamato la guardia medica perché aveva la febbre alta. Il medico a sua volta ha chiamato il 118 ma quando i soccorsi sono arrivati nell’abitazione dell’uomo non c’è stato più nulla da fare. Sul corpo del 46enne il sostituto procuratore Maria Chiara Paolucci ha disposto l’autopsia.

Altri due anziani sono morti ieri in casa a Genova mentre questa mattina un 82enne è deceduto nella sua abitazione di Zoagli. Sul posto oltre ai soccorsi sono arrivati i carabinieri.

In molti casi pare che i decessi siano dovuti a patologie di cui già le vittime, in prevalenza anziani, soffrivano ma le temperature di questi giorni potrebbero aver inciso pesantemente su fisici già debilitati.

E per i prossimi tre giorni la situazione non cambierà come ha sottolineato l’avviso emesso dal ministero della Salute.

Per oggi la massima percepita è fissata a quota 37° contro una temperatura effettiva di circa 30 gradi. Stessa cifra anche per domani, martedì, con una minima prevista alle 8 del mattino di 26 gradi.

Mercoledì il calo di un grado sia sulla minima, sia sulla massima percepita (36°).</s>Rome, August 7 - The heat wave Italy is enduring is set to continue with the number of cities on the health ministry's maximum, level three alert set to go up to 12. On Tuesday 10 cities were on level three - Bologna, Bolzano, Brescia, Florence, Genoa, Milan, Perugia, Trieste, Venice and Verona. Rome will be added to the list on Wednesday and Turin will on Thursday.</s>Private-equity firm Advent International has held talks with potential buyers about selling pharmacy company Genoa Healthcare, according to people familiar with the matter.

Genoa, which could be worth about $2.5 billion in a sale, has attracted interest from drugstore chain Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc., among other suitors, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the details aren’t public. Deliberations are ongoing and there’s no guarantee a deal will be reached, according to the people.

Genoa operates more than 400 full-service pharmacies within community mental-health centers in the U.S., and serves about 650,000 customers, according to a company fact sheet. It also has a team of more than 250 psychiatrists and nurse practitioners who provide telepsychiatry services to mental-health patients.

Representatives for Advent and Walgreens both declined to comment.

Advent, based in Boston, has invested about $40 billion across about 340 private equity deals since 1989, according to its website. It invested in Renton, Washington-based Genoa in 2015 for an undisclosed sum, alongside existing shareholders including the private equity firm Nautic Partners. The buyout firm subsequently backed Genoa’s management to acquire 1DocWay and Medication Management Systems in 2015 and 2017, respectively.

If Walgreens did buy Genoa, adding the pharmacies would give the drugstore chain another growth opportunity as its competitors consolidate and add new services. Earlier this year, it completed its acquisition of 1,932 new stores from a deal last year with Rite Aid Corp.

Walgreens’s biggest retail rival, CVS Health Corp., is buying health insurer Aetna Inc. for about $68 billion in a bid to create a vertically integrated medical company that will try to tame health-care costs and bring more services to CVS’s retail clinics. In March, Cigna Corp. cut a deal to buy Express Scripts Holding Co., a drug benefit manager, for $54 billion.</s>Members of the Department of Civil Protection distribute water bottles in Rome, one of the cities on red alert. Photo: Andreas Solaro/AFP

Several recent deaths in the Italian city of Genoa are thought to be linked to the prolonged heatwave across southern Europe, with temperatures set to remain high across the country and ten cities on 'red alert' for health risks.

Authorities believe that the deaths of around ten people in the Ligurian region since Saturday were at least partially caused by the heat, according to Italian media reports.

Prosecutors have opened an investigation into the death of a 46-year-old in his home after reporting a fever, Ansa reported, while the others who died were elderly, aged between 80 and 85 with pre-existing health conditions.

Italy's Civil Protection Department warned residents of the area to take precautions including staying inside during the hottest part of the day and regularly drinking water. They also said social services would give extraassistance to some of the vulnerable groups in society, including the elderly, who were also invited to use air-conditioned social centres or public libraries to keep cool.
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Genoa was one of ten cities on a 'red' or 'level 1' alert for high risk of heat-related health risks on Tuesday, according to a Ministry of Health bulletin. High temperatures were compounded by high humidity levels in the area, making the city feel even hotter than it was with perceived temperatures of close to 40C.

The red alerts were in place in all ten affected cities -- Bologna, Bolzano, Brescia, Florence, Genoa, Milan Perugia, Trieste, Venice and Verona -- until at least Thursday, and will also apply to Rome from Wednesday and Turin from Thursday onwards.

Many other cities in the country were placed on an orange or level 2 alert. The difference between the two is that while both mean the heat poses a risk to health, in 'level 3' conditions, even healthy and active members of the population are likely to be affected, while during an orange alert, it is predominantly vulnerable groups such as children and the elderly who are at risk.

The government has set up a dedicated helpline, reachable by dialling 1500 in Italy, to offer advice on coping with the hot weather as well as information on healthcare services.</s>There is no relief in sight for Italy as hot temperatures and high levels of humidity continue to impact the country. Ten cities, all located in the centre and northern areas of the country, have received a “red mark” from the Ministry of Health, meaning people must be aware of the life-threatening risks they can incur if they underestimate the heat. Among them there is Milan, where thermometers have hit 33C (91.4F), five more degrees than the average temperatures and three more than the one recorded at the same time last year. And in Brescia, another northern city, thermometers hit 35C (95F), with some 43 percent humidity.

The list also include touristic cities such as Bologna, which was yesterday hit by a tragic explosion which left one dead and dozens injured, as well as Florence, Genoa, Verona and Venice. The Ministry already warned Rome will also receive the red mark tomorrow, as meteorologists forecasted 33C (91.4), warning the high level of humidity means the temperature will actually feel like people will actually perceive 38C (100.4F). Forecasters of Italian meteorologic institute Centro Epson Meteo warned the heat will create discomfort also during the night, where temperatures will be as high as 26C (78.8F). Throughout all the Italian peninsula, the climate will continue to be very hot, particularly in the Centre-South. In the North, the heat will ease from Friday, thanks to a cold-weather perturbation that will touch the Alps.

Britons heading to Italy for their summer holidays have been warned of the risks torrid days could bring if their dangers were overlooked. The World Health Organisation (WHO) said: “Heat can trigger heat stroke but can also worsen existing conditions, such as cardiovascular, respiratory, renal or mental illness. “Europe is experiencing a very hot summer which is expected to continue for the next few weeks. "Medical professionals and public health authorities must be prepared to face the heat waves of this Summer and the possible health consequences of exposure to heat.”</s>According to what has been reported by La Gazzetta dello Sport, Zenit St. Petersburg are closing in on the signing of Diego Laxalt from Genoa.The Uruguayan left-midfielder/left-back has been linked to a number of clubs over the summer, including Crystal Palace in England, as well as Lazio and Inter Milan in Serie A. However, his destiny appears to be to join Zenit in the Russian Premier League.Zenit and Laxalt have reportedly come to an agreement, all that is left is for Genoa and Zenit to agree on a figure.For more news, views and features, visit our homepage.</s>Plenty of attention has been paid to the European-born fighters who have joined the Islamic State and other Islamist militant groups in the Middle East — and the efforts of European countries to stop them. But what about those fighting in Ukraine?

In Italy, it has long been an open secret that far-right activists were fighting in Donbass, the eastern Ukrainian region where pro-Russian separatists — with Russian government assistance — have been fighting the Ukrainian government since 2014. Italian authorities, however, didn’t seem interested in stopping them.

That suddenly changed last week, when prosecutors in the northern Italian city of Genoa ordered the arrest of six men accused of joining pro-Russian militias in Donbass and recruiting others to their cause. The arrests marked the first time Italian authorities have charged anyone with fighting in Ukraine, though three of the men remain at large. The same prosecutors have also charged 15 other people with being part of the recruitment ring.

“What’s interesting is that some of them were already known faces whose activities in Ukraine were common knowledge,” said Francesco Marone, a research fellow at the Italian Institute for International Political Studies.

One of the fugitives is Andrea Palmieri, a former leader of the far-right hooligan group Bulldog Lucca who had previously appeared on national TV boasting about fighting in Ukraine. Another one is Gabriele Carugati, the son of a politician from the far-right League party — the League is one of Italy’s two current governing parties — who had publicly praised her son’s choice to fight in Ukraine.

[Now that the Islamic State has fallen in Iraq and Syria, where are all its fighters going?]

The Genoa police had been investigating far-right networks in the area since 2016, according to the newspaper Genova Today. But the arrests seem to have come in response to complaints from Ukraine earlier this year. In April, a member of the Ukrainian Parliament submitted a list of 25 Italian citizens believed to be fighting with pro-Russian militias.

Authorities in Genoa carried out the investigations and arrests in collaboration with the ROS, the anti-organizated crime and anti-terrorism branch of the Carabinieri, Italy’s paramilitary national police force, but no officials from the national government have yet commented on the arrests.

Foreign fighters from Italy generally fall into three categories: those fighting with Islamist groups, mostly in Syria or Libya; those joining the YPG, a Syrian Kurdish militia, and other Kurdish groups; and those fighting in Ukraine, Marone said.

While Italy approved a special law against foreign fighters in 2015, it targeted youth joining the Islamic State and other Islamist groups. But it does not apply to those joining separatist groups in Ukraine, who are being prosecuted as unauthorized mercenaries rather than terrorists because pro-Russian militias are not considered terrorist groups by Italy.

“Authorities have different attitudes toward these 3 groups,” Marone said. “ISIS returnees are seen as a threat because they belong to an organization that also carries attacks in Europe, while foreign fighters coming back from Kurdistan are widely tolerated, and so were those coming back from Ukraine”

Marone argued that far-right fighters still post a threat because of their links to violent groups within Italy. “They are seen as dangerous not because they could carry some kind of terror attack or guerrilla operations in Italy, but because they are violent individuals who have learned how to use weapons,” he said.

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A heat wave in Genoa, Italy, kills seven people.