<nettime> milano biohazard, or from the europe of schengen to the europe of shenzhen

[Alex Foti <alex.foti@gmail.com>]

ciao amici - hi Felix, Brian, Geert and ecosocialist/anarchautonomist
friends near and far

birds are singing and an ambulance hasn't gone thru the deserted
highway in 10 minute - a good dawn - although not buried under a
pile of corpses like Bergamo and Brescia, Milano has more than 1,000
dead and unfortunately the outbreak started one mile from here. Our
general in this battle is epidemiologist Galli who leads the Sacco
hospital near here. He cured ebola, he's unafraid of covid. Sacco
hospital is also one of the few ones where health workers weren't
infected in significant numbers. In fact, the way Lombardy has handled
the epidemic since the Codogno outbreak at the border with Emilia
has spread the virus to other hospitals and other towns. Also the
reluctance to shut down the industrial heart of Lombardy and the
global financial, tourist, shopping, academic hub of Milano is being
paid dearly, especially by male pensioners and middle-aged female
nurses.

In retrospect, it's easy to stigmatize diehard boosterism and
mismanagement of the pandemic. Fact is Lombardy's focus on customized
health care and hospitalization, to the detriment of general
practictioners and public health on the ground, hampered containment
and has caused 9,000 official deaths in the region alone. Neighboring
Veneto, also governed by the League, has done many more swabs since
day one, cured more people at home and is being more effective
in dealing with coronavirus - also thanks to special consultant
virologist Palo (whose academic career was done abroad because
italy shut down chairs of virology in the 90s). While Salvini has
alwasy wanted to keep businesses open (and now wants people in church
for easter), the governor has worn the mask early on and managed to
get an ICU done in the Milano Messe Fairgrounds. As of today, wearing
a surgical/ffp/n95 mask is compulsory outdoors but only in Lombardy
(as it should well be - autonomous volunteer brigades who are amongst
the few ones traversing the city to deliver aid have long campaigned
to get everybody a mask - do wear it always when outside even if there
are no people around - the lesson of east asian cities is clear).

So general surgeons and surgeon generals are commanders in this war
against alien micro-invaders, while asshole politicians like boris
or trump have to do somersaults to have the public forget they have
been murderous fumblers. In Italy the Conte center-left government
is generally praised for not having buckled under viral pressure.
Maybe, but he put in charge the head of Civil Defence (who says he
doesn't wear a mask - in Rome the virus is not under your ass like
here - 25 cases and 2 dead in my block only) and then had to appoint
a special commissioner because PPEs were not reaching Lombardy and
when they did, the Milanese threw em away in disgust (these are
not masks, they are swiffers). So while Schengen solidarity was
being undermined by Merkel's Germany and Rutte's Holland, we had to
thank Shenzhen solidarity - at a price, China sold us masks when
European countries where preventing medical exports (this was later
corrected, but we have only seen chinese, cuban, albanian doctors
coming to the rescue). After reading Draghi's letter to the FT, which
outlines the right macroeconomic plan (liquidity, helicoptermoney-like
social transfers, debt monetization and coronabonds) to prevent a
supply shock from becoming the Greatest Depression, i am not alone in
thinking italians and europeans would be better off if he became prime
minister. Certainly lagarde has been painfully incompetent in running
the crisis, although QE is being extended sine die. In comparison,
trump's 2trillion package is more aggressive in sustaining demand (and
cash has already reached recipients, unlike here - we have yet to see
a nickel).

The EU and the eurozone who have been hanging on since the eurocrisis,
the migrant crisis, brexit and trump, now have to work hard to justify
their existence. The franco-german compromise (france, italy, spain
and the majority of population and gdp supported eurobond issuance but
angela said nein) will keep things from falling apart but the damage
to the european project is likely to be permanent: italy is no longer
europhile, while spain is going through our same ordeal.

To conclude my new dawn fades ramblings, let me jot down a few notes
on labor, which is being strengthened by this crisis. Labor is now
more crucial than capital to beat the virus, however individual
workers are expendable. This has to change and the precariat is
rising, from amazon warehouses to instacart supermarkets, from
deliveroo to wal-mart. Precarious workers now have the power although
they are exposed to so many more risks in comparison to white-collar
teleworkers. Health, sanitation, cleaning, retail, delivery, food
workers are the ones we depend on to survive during the monadic
lockdown. No work must be perfomed without protection. Since capital
is callous, the ultimate form of social distancing is the general
strike. Labor must strike to protect society from business. Precarious
people are owed total health coverage, universal social transfers,
hazard and sick pay, protection from anti-union dismissals (see staten
island) but especially a doubling of the wage that reflects their
social value. Bankers and CEOs have never been more useless, it's the
bodies and minds of health temps and gig workers who are saving our
asses. Neoliberal capitalism has proved unable to stock up neither
ventilators nor masks, gloves, goggles. Hayek and Friedman have been
great to provide people with frivolities, but proved unable to defend
people's lives. Gone is the market as deus ex machina, the visible
hands and fists of the state are back in fashion. How repressive and
authoritarian or eco and socialist is this all gonna be? I am reading
nettime to find out, although i urge everybody to think what a society
made of green, yellow, red QR coes is gonna look like. Green? It means
you can go out, take public transportation and be productive back
again because you're immune.. What kind of demi-life awaits us?

milan is a little wuhan,

alex



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