Country Doctor

Close to Codogno - epicenter of the Coronavirus Pandemic in Italy. Doctor Luigi Cavanna, the head of the oncology ward in Piacenza hospital, and Gabriele Cremona, deputy of the oncology ward, took upon themselves to visit and treat positive and allegedly positive patients in their houses.

Doctors diagnosed the first case of Covid-19 in Italy on February 21st 2020, and the country quickly became the ‘epicenter’ of the pandemic, with almost 1000 people dying everyday in March. By January 2021, there had been more than 77.000 deaths.



In March the Italian government imposed a national lockdown, limiting movements, prohibiting social life and keeping to the minimum the contacts in the hospitals.

The Head of Oncology at the Hospital of Piacenza, in the northern area of Italy, Dr. Luigi Cavanna began visiting the homes of patients with Covid-19 during the country’s first national lockdown. From the start, he assisted them with the first symptoms of the disease - such as coughing or a fever - much in the same way that he would treat a patient with the earliest signs of cancer. 



Country Doctor is a piece of reportage that shows the courage, lucidity, resilience and humanity of a doctor who, in order to confront a global crisis, entered the homes of his patients without fear, and treated the disease in its early stages before they risked to degenerate and be hospitalized in intensive care units, which were already too full and on the verge of collapse. 

Dr. Cavanna was the first doctor in the world to attempt this treatment during the first wave of Covid-19. He took care of more than 330 patients and none of his patients have died. In July 2020, he was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize as representative of the Italian Health Corps.