Giuseppe Berardelli, 72, from Casigno in Italy's hardest-hit Lombardy region, died of coronavirus

An Italian priest has died of coronavirus but did not give up a respirator bought for him to a younger patient, friends have said.

Guiseppe Berardelli, 72, from Casigno in Italy's hardest-hit Lombardy region, died in a local hospital last week after being diagnosed with the virus.

A report in Italian media, sent around the world on Twitter by an American priest serving as communications consult to the Vatican, claimed that Berardelli passed away after giving up a respirator that was bought for him to a younger person he didn't know.

But subsequent accounts of his death from those who knew him suggested this was false.

Berardelli did die of the virus and was known for his acts of charity, but friends say they are not aware of any respirator bought for him.

A friend told Italian media that he was the kind of man who would have have given up his space in an ICU for another person, but added that nobody is sure if that is really what happened.

'We do not have certainty,' Friar Giulio Dellavite, who knew Berardelli for 20 years, told the Catholic Herald.

James Martin, the priest who initially brought the case to light and praised Berardelli as a saint, also tweeted out a clarification - saying that he was mistaken.

Lombardy is at the centre of Italy's coronavirus crisis, reporting more than 300 deaths yesterday and accounting for almost half of the nation's total (pictured, pallbearers take the coffin of a victim for burial in a cemetery in Lombardy)

At least 60 priests have died in Italy after contracting coronavirus, which now has more than double the number of deaths as China

Berardelli is among at least 60 priest in Italy who have died from coronavirus after the Pope called on them to 'have courage' to attend the sick.

Some 5,476 people have died after testing positive for coronavirus across the nation, with more than 59,000 cases of the virus confirmed.

Among the dead are at least 60 priests, the majority of whom were over the age of 70, the Catholic Herald reported.

During a Mass in early March, Pope Francis, 83, called on Italian priests to 'have courage to go out to the sick' amid the rapidly growing pandemic.

'We pray to God also for our priests, so they have courage to go out to the sick, bringing the strength of the Word of God and the Eucharist,' he said.

'To accompany the medical workers and volunteers in the work they are doing.'

The names of 51 diocesan priests who passed away after contracting coronavirus were published by the Avvenire newspaper on Sunday.

The publication also noted that a further nine deaths had been reported in religious communities across Italy.

Some of these priests had underlying health conditions, it was said, and the youngest to die was 53-year-old Paolo Camminati - the parish priest of Our Lady of Lourdes in Piacenza.

Five further priests who tested positive for COVID-19 have also reportedly passed away in the same city.

Medical workers stretch a patient from an Italian Red Cross ambulance into an intensive care unit set up in a sports center outside the San Raffaele hospital in Milan

A man wearing a protective mask that was lying unconscious on the ground near a bus stop is carried away by the medical personnel in Rome

At least 60 priests have died in Italy amid the country's coronavirus pandemic as the Pope called on them to 'have courage' to attend the sick (Pictured: Pope Francis)

'It is a tough trial. We are dismayed. We feel great suffering,' Bishop Gianni Ambrosio of Piacenza-Bobbio said.

'It is a darkness that we must face, but with the hope that God never abandons us, that he himself has gone through all the suffering to overcome it.'

Bergamo, in northern Italy, has been hit hardest by the virus with reports of 20 diocesan priests passing away, Aleteia reported.

It was also said 17 more from the area had been taken to hospital with two in intensive care after being diagnosed with the deadly COVID-19.

Other dioceses which have lost priests to coronavirus include Parma, Cremona, Milan, Lodi, Brescia, Casale Monferrato, Tortona, Trento, Bolzano, Salerno, Ariano Irpino, Nuoro, and Pesaro.

'It is painful to see the priests fall sick,' Enrico Salmi, the bishop of Parma, said. 'Sometimes it happens [to them] out of pastoral zeal. They enter the intensive care unit where, naturally, no one is supposed to go.'

- This article has been updated since first publication to include reports that cast doubt on the claims originally made by Italian media that Fr Berardelli donated a respirator to a younger patient.