At the beginning of December, the health authorities reported a fourfold increase in cases of Covid-19 contagion with the new total of 12,609 cases entering into five digits for the first time since early September (there will be an updated Health Ministry report this weekend). The total number of people testing positive for Covid since the arrival of the pandemic in March, 2020 rose to 9,739.856 with the death toll rising by nine to 130,034 while 247 patients are currently in intensive care wards. While Health Minister Carla Vizzotti attributed this low mortality rate to vaccination, recommending an intensified booster campaign, the director-general of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, warned that a deadlier variant of coronavirus could be on the loose while adding: “90 percent of the world population now has some level of immunity to Covid, whether from previous infection or vaccination.”