The Covid Commission’s trial of Rezza. The charges before the questions

On Tuesday 10 November, Giovanni Rezza, an epidemiologist and former Director-General of Health Prevention at the Ministry of Health, was questioned by the Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry into Covid from 6.46 pm to 11.06 pm. Four hours and twenty minutes, including two brief adjournments, during which the establishment of the facts was repeatedly superseded by a search for confirmation of conclusions that had already been drawn. Rezza had been summoned for a “voluntary hearing”, but found himself having to refute personal insinuations and defend himself against allegations that went far beyond the questions necessary to reconstruct what had happened during the pandemic. The full recording is available on the Chamber of Deputies’ website. The matter also concerns the responsibility of the chair of the session, as a parliamentary committee has powers defined by law and must exercise them in accordance with precise rules.

Alice Buonguerrieri, an MP for Fratelli d’Italia, devoted a significant portion of the hearing to the possibility that even vaccinated people could transmit the coronavirus. Rezza explained repeatedly that vaccines reduced the likelihood of infection without eliminating it entirely, and that this reduction varied over time and with viral variants. The MP continued to ask what the scientific basis was for the restrictions on the unvaccinated, returning to the comparison with those who had recovered or were undergoing testing. The proportionality of the restrictions is a legitimate question, but one that requires an assessment of the expected health benefits and the alternatives available at the time they were adopted. It is not enough to demonstrate that a vaccinated person could transmit the virus to conclude that vaccination does not reduce transmission. Rezza even acknowledged that, according to current knowledge, the protection conferred by natural infection and that conferred by vaccination are roughly equivalent in duration. Not even this concession put an end to the dispute, as the MP continued to frame the debate in terms of justifying the restrictions, without quantitatively addressing the reduction in risk that Rezza had outlined.

Even more revealing was the discussion regarding the AstraZeneca open days. Rezza distinguished between the ministerial recommendations and the decisions of the regional authorities who actually organised those events, suggesting that the Commission should also hear from the regional officials. Buonguerrieri’s response was: “No, Doctor, on the contrary, we must hear from you.” The MP continued to attribute a political role to him which he disputed, repeatedly urging him not to get worked up and accusing him of failing to answer. In an investigation into accountability, establishing who made a decision is essential to determining to whom responsibility should be attributed. Here, when the person being questioned pointed to other institutional bodies that should be heard, his explanation was rejected and the personal criticism continued. A reconstruction of accountability that fails to examine the entire decision-making chain risks attributing to the central level even decisions made elsewhere.

Senator Antonella Zedda adopted a similar approach when questioning Rezza about conversations he had had in 2020 with Guido Silvestri regarding monoclonal antibodies. Faced with recollections that did not entirely match, dating back six years, she went so far as to ask him whether Silvestri was lying or whether he was suffering from ‘severe amnesia’. Yet Article 16, paragraph 4, of the Rules of Procedure allows the Committee to organise cross-examinations between individuals who have already been heard. There was therefore a means of clarifying the discrepancy through further investigation; instead, during the hearing, an alternative choice between lying and memory loss was repeatedly put forward. Zedda herself read out a communication dated 2 November 2020 in which Rezza reported that Minister Speranza had said to go ahead with the monoclonal antibodies initiative. The following day, the senator publicly claimed that Speranza was aware of Eli Lilly’s offer of free supplies and that the government had rejected it, without referring to that communication and without having fully explained the reasons why the clinical trial had not gone ahead.

The debate on home care followed a similar course. Buonguerrieri reiterated the ‘Paracetamol and watchful waiting’ approach, whilst Rezza referred to the text of the circular dated 30 November 2020, which also provided for the use of anti-inflammatory drugs. Subsequent studies were also cited to challenge recommendations made before that evidence was available. Responding to a question from PD MP Gian Antonio Girelli, Rezza observed that judging 2020 using information from 2021 and 2022 is “entirely misleading”. Determining whether an error occurred requires reconstructing the evidence available at the time of the decision, as this is the only way to establish whether it was avoidable. When Rezza attempted to protest, the chair intervened, effectively silencing him. Whilst the chair may certainly reprimand the person being questioned, it is the chair’s responsibility to ensure the fairness of the entire hearing.

It is precisely the conduct of the meeting that presents the most serious institutional problem. After Buonguerrieri had accused Rezza of treating dissenting scientists as “the village idiot” and had spoken of a “little charade”, the chair intervened to reprimand the witness, who was told that he could not continue to respond in that manner to a commissioner. Immediately afterwards, according to the official report, the hearing was suspended for four minutes. Later on, ‘quick questions, precise answers’ were requested. The committee members made personal attacks, whilst the reprimand was directed at those on the receiving end. This asymmetry is documented by the sequence of interventions. With the opposition virtually absent – only PD MP Girelli having spoken – the chair’s oversight of the fairness of the debate took on even greater importance.

The rules on this point are explicit. Article 82 of the Constitution grants committees of inquiry the same powers and subject them to the same limitations as the judiciary. Article 6(1)(b) of the Covid Committee’s rules of procedure entrusts the chair with the task of regulating discussions, whilst Article 16(3) expressly assigns to the chair the task of assessing the admissibility of questions. The Vice-Chair, Francesco Maria Salvatore Ciancitto, who chaired the entire sitting – as confirmed by the official summary report No. 153 of 10 November 2026 – therefore had a specific regulatory responsibility. The repetition of personal insinuations and the treatment meted out to Rezza’s responses raise a concrete question as to how that responsibility was exercised. Not every inappropriate question constitutes a breach; but a conduct that allows such allegations to be repeated calls for an explanation.

The conclusion of the hearing illustrates just how far the debate had gone. Zedda challenged the management of the risk of coronavirus transmission via aerosols, a serious scientific issue that does indeed merit a thorough investigation. During his speech, however, he raised the choice between “culpable negligence or a deliberate decision”, argued that there had been “stubborn persistence” in the wrong direction, and concluded by stating that this was not a question and did not merit a reply. Immediately afterwards, the chair closed the hearing. An allegation of liability was thus made publicly without giving the person concerned the opportunity to respond at that hearing.

The Constitutional Court, in its ruling 231 of 1975, clarified that the role of parliamentary committees of inquiry “is not to ‘judge’”, but “merely to gather information and data necessary for the exercise of the Chambers’ functions”. On Tuesday evening, however, the commissioners repeatedly passed judgement on personal responsibility while they were still collecting the statements needed to verify these claims. An inquiry must be able to amend its conclusions in the light of the responses received.

The public nature of the hearing confirms the problem. On 11 November, Buonguerrieri claimed that Rezza had admitted that all the government’s measures had “the sole aim of achieving mass vaccination”, announcing the collapse of the scientific justifications for lockdowns and the Green Pass. In the transcript, however, Rezza had stated that the government had promoted vaccinations “not only to save lives” but also to speed up the reopening of the economy. The difference is substantial: the MP’s statement omits precisely the public health objective explicitly stated by the epidemiologist. And acknowledging that a measure was adopted by the government through a political decision does not prove that that decision lacked a scientific basis. It is a flawed inference, constructed through an incomplete representation of the witness’s words.

The Commission’s mandate remains in place, enabling an assessment of what this lengthy session has actually achieved. Article 1 of Law No. 22 of 5 March 2024 stipulates that the inquiry must evaluate the measures adopted during the pandemic ‘also with a view to addressing a possible future pandemic of similar scale and severity’. Rezza had devoted a significant part of his report to the issues still outstanding: overcrowded A&E departments, community care homes not yet fully operational, delays in telemedicine and shortcomings in the surveillance of respiratory viruses, exacerbated by the lack of implementing decrees necessary for the new information system. The transcript does not reveal any substantive questions from the commissioners on these issues. After nearly four hours of actual proceedings, no one had delved into the vulnerabilities that Rezza had identified as priorities for tackling a future pandemic.

What happened on 10 November cannot therefore be dismissed as a mere clash between MPs and an expert unwilling to accept their objections. Article 7, paragraph 3, of the Rules of Procedure stipulates that the Bureau, supplemented by representatives of the parliamentary groups, shall examine procedural issues arising during the proceedings. This is the specific forum in which to review the recording of the sitting and verify how the powers conferred on the Chair by Articles 6 and 16 have been exercised. Should any breaches of the Rules of Procedure come to light, they must be acknowledged and addressed.

Members of Parliament are representatives of the Republic, vested with powers derived from the Constitution and the law. They are not lords who are permitted to exercise those powers at their own discretion. The safeguards afforded to elected representatives protect the freedom of the parliamentary function and coexist with the rules governing its exercise. Here, there are documented facts, identifiable lines of responsibility and precise regulatory provisions: the grounds therefore exist for demanding an institutional response.

The Commission should report on how the hearing was conducted and what useful insights actually emerged from it. Because the next pandemic will not be tackled more effectively thanks to the admissions the commissioners managed to elicit, but thanks to the genuine mistakes they were able to demonstrate.