SERIATE, Italy: If there is anything the Rev. Mario Carminati and the traumatized residents of Italys Bergamo province remember about the worst days of the coronavirus outbreak, its the wail of ambulance sirens piercing the silence of lockdown.
Around the clock for weeks on end, ambulances screamed through Bergamos valleys and towns in a terrifying soundtrack of death, as mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers gasping for air were rushed to the hospital. Thousands never came back.
As the world counts more than 1 million COVID-19 victims, the quiet of everyday life and hum of industry has returned to Bergamo, which along with the surrounding Lombardy region was the one-time epicenter of the outbreak in Europe. But the memory of those dark winter days, and the monumental toll of dead they left behind, has remained with those who survived only to see the rest of the world fall victim,…