Italy forces all shops to close except supermarkets, pharmacies and drugstores for at least two weeks. Rstaurants have to close also if they can't provide 1m space between patrons.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/11/italy-faces-ca...

Ups, didn't see it on the front. My bad.

/e >Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.

So it doesn't seem to be off topic after all, or all COVID19 stories would be.

IMHO indeed a lot are. About every 6th story, right now every 4th story, in /newest is virus related in the last couple of days. One aim of hackernews is to be the place to find stories that are outside the usual 24/7 breaking news circle. Two hours ago it was Denmark closing schools with 200 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22550108 before Germany (Merkel) saying 70% of the country could be infected and when Italy news broke an hours ago the quality of the discussion already suffered https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22550623 It's the top story on CNN and BBC news.

I see your point but on the other hand this is not the soccer world cup or some tech event. It could evolve in a once in a lifetime outbreak and the 8th largest economy of the world in essence partialy shutting down is something to discuss with the hn crowd. Perhaps my view on this is a bit skewed as i could drive to italy in two hours. If no one is intersted these stories arn't upvoted enough to be visible.

Probably 50% of the post in newest now :(.