Roma players & staff donate salary to provide hospital with ventilators and beds in coronavirus fight

The Serie A side have donated equipment to a hospital in the Italian capital to aid the effort to stop the spread of the virus

will donate ventilators and beds to a hospital in Rome to aid the fight against the coronavirus pandemic after players and staff have agreed to give up a day's salary.

The salary donations on top of individual contributions to the club's campaign amount to more than €200,000 (£185,000/$213,000).

Roma have raised around €460,000 (£424,000/$491,000) for the Lazzaro Spallanzani Hospital in the last week, which has been one of the nation's most important centres in the effort to beat the Covid-19 spread.

Roma will use some of the funds to buy three intensive care ventilators, five pulmonary ventilators for sub-intensive care and eight new intensive care beds for the hospital.

Earlier this week, the club delivered 13,000 FFP2 masks to hospitals in the Italian capital, along with 120 bottles of hand sanitiser.

“The players and the coaching staff wanted to do something very meaningful for the city and the people suffering in this country,” Roma CEO Guido Fienga said.

“At moments like this, it’s important that we all take on our responsibilities and do what we can to help. Whether it’s the president, our players and staff, our fantastic former players and all our fans, from Rome and elsewhere, everyone who has contributed has helped pay for these new intensive care ventilators, which will help save real lives.

“We’re not giving up though and now we want to raise even more money, surpass our €500,000 target and buy more essential hospital equipment.”

#ASRoma players & staff have agreed to donate a day’s salary - on top of individual contributions - to the club’s #COVID19 campaign.



Roma has immediately ordered:



▪️ 3 Intensive care ventilators

▪️ 5 Pulmonary ventilators

▪️ 8 Intensive care beds



More: https://t.co/6LnmT2EKyx pic.twitter.com/OeEsOhGALa — AS Roma English (@ASRomaEN) March 20, 2020

replaced on Thursday as the country worst hit by the spread of the virus, having suffered more fatalities since the outbreak began.

Friday saw Italy suffer the biggest daily rise in deaths from Covid-19, taking the number up to 4,032 fatalities, while there have been 47,021 confirmed infections.

The government has called in the military to help enforce the lockdown which has been issued across the country.