The 53-year-old Neapolitan and former nursing-home legal consultant is the owner of a small villa on Ponza, one of four islands in the Pontine archipelago in the Tyrrhenian Sea, about half way between Rome and Naples.
This summer, Italy is reopening – or plans to, barring a fourth wave – and he can’t keep up with the requests.
Ponza is popular with Roman families, since it’s an easy shot from the capital and cheaper than the glitzy islands of Capri and Ischia farther south.
In an interview Thursday, Capri Mayor Marino Lembo said 100 per cent of the island’s registered adult residents had been vaccinated, as well as the hospitality workers who live on the mainland and commute by ferry.
Tourism is an essential Italian industry, accounting for about 13 per cent of gross domestic product, double the Canadian level, though not as high as Spain’s .
Mr. Draghi is gambling that Italy’s rising vaccination rate and remaining restrictions, such as the 10 p.m.
The last Italian summer ended in disaster, when sloppy physical distancing triggered a deadly second wave that pushed the country back into lockdown.
More than 29 per cent of the population has received the first dose and 13 per cent the second dose – both in line with the European Union average, though still well short of Britain’s.
Last week, Tourism Minister Massimo Garavaglia said the green pass would be “valid for everyone, also, and above all, tourists from outside the EU,” notably Britain, United States and Israel, where the vaccination rates are high.