Every year, several hundreds of foreign seasonal workers come to the Sicilian village of Cassibile and the surrounding area for the harvest season. They usually live in makeshift settlements. Now, the provincial healthcare department (ASP) has set up a medical unit specifically for these migrant workers. The healthcare assistance for the migrants will be available from Monday to Friday between 4 pm and 7 pm.

The doctors there will work together with cultural mediators to help the migrants, according to the head of the local foreigners department, Lavinia Lo Curzio. This will make it easier for medical staff to communicate with the migrants, she said. Among the ressources available, she said, are "multi-language materials on how to prevent contracting COVID-19." 

Lucio Ficarra, the local ASP general director, said that, "considering the particular fragility and socio-economic marginalisation of the [migrant farmworkers], the medical unit has been provided with basic pharmaceuticals."

He said that in the past, special medical units like this one had had many positive effects. For example, he explained, the number of migrants who went to emergency rooms with non-emergency medical problems had decreased significantly.