Hot Zone

Northern Italy's nursing homes were hit hard by COVID-19, to the point that people are calling for criminal investigations.

"One of the hardest-hit communities in Lombardy is the town of Nembro, in the foothills of the Alps.

Of the 87 residents in Nembro's main nursing home, the Nembro Nursing Home Foundation, 34 died from the virus.

While law enforcement authorities won't comment on whether the home is under investigation, its director, Barbara Codalli, told CNN there are no allegations of wrongdoing against the home which, she says, never took in any Covid patients.

As soon as staff realized that the virus had spread to the home, Codalli said: "We decided to shut down the structure to families and to close the day care, even if we didn't know at the time what was actually happening, but with the feeling that something out of the ordinary was happening."

"We started using PPE, masks, not easily because finding them was hard, we found them at absurd prices," she adds.

But still, the home was overwhelmed by the virus, which Codalli said badly hit its staff, killing its president and one of its doctors."