Four patients died, two are intoxicated and about 200 people had to be evacuated after the fire that broke out overnight at the San Giovanni Evangelista hospital in Tivoli, a few kilometers from Rome, and which has left the center heavily damaged.
The victims are two men aged 76 and 86 and an 84-year-old woman, while the body of another 86-year-old woman was also found, but the causes of death are being verified because she could have died shortly before the fire, the police reported. firefighters. Two other people had to be hospitalized after becoming poisoned by the smoke.
According to first impressions, the fire started in the back of the hospital and spread to the floor where the outpatient clinic is located and from there it would have reached the emergency rooms and intensive care rooms.
After an initial inspection, firefighters reconstructed that the fire originated from special waste and smoke invaded the hospital from the 3rd floor to the last.
All the hospital staff and about 130 patients had to be evacuated during the night, including several children and newborns, and the less serious patients were momentarily transferred to a sports pavilion in the area and the serious patients to nearby hospitals.
In total, 69 patients were transferred to various hospitals in Rome and its province and 23 ambulances were used and two medical units were also installed on site to care for the patients.
The Tivoli Prosecutor's Office opened an investigation after the fire and an autopsy will be performed on the bodies of the victims to determine the causes of death.
