Things were just fine for the 16-year-old, otherwise the day on the beach in Ostia last week would probably have been his last. A visitor to the beach noticed that his head was floating in the sea under water. He and another managed to get the teenager to shore and administer first aid. Actually, a Bagnino should have intervened, one of the lifeguards trained as lifeguards who belong to Italy’s beaches in their red shirts. But nobody was there. As in most of Ostia’s free beaches. Perhaps that’s why an 82-year-old man died there a week earlier after passing out in the shallow water. There are also first deaths elsewhere in the Lazio region on free beaches without lifeguards.
Now, Ostia is not a remote backwater with infrequent beachgoers. 230,000 people live in this outer district of Rome, and in summer thousands upon thousands flock to the beaches from the sweltering metropolis. There are nicer ones on the Lazio coast, but in Ostia the sea can be reached cheaply by train without traffic jams. And who his towel at a free Spiaggia libera spreads out, can enjoy an inexpensive mini-vacation, which is sacrosanct for many Romans.
The district government takes care of garbage, showers and lifeguards on free beaches. At least she should. She was looking for people who would take care of free beaches this season, who would be the lifeguard from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. – the municipality has the necessary equipment such as defibrillators. And the lifeguard can rent out loungers and umbrellas. At the end of the deadline, close to the start of the season, there was just one applicant. Attempts by the administration to at least find lifeguards also flopped.
The paid lidos are also looking for staff
Why? A job that promises a summer at the beach, the prospect of meeting a lot of people – isn’t that almost vacation? Oh well. Ostia’s free beaches are often louder and more boisterous than lidos. There is a lot of rubbish waiting in the evenings and ten-hour workdays, including weekends. But a representative of the lifeguard union in Lazio sees the main reasons for this shortage of skilled workers elsewhere: bad pay with great responsibility; Work for only three or four months and therefore hardly any entitlement to unemployment benefits. People prefer to look for long-term jobs. Lido operators also find it difficult to find Bagnini everywhere, even with higher salaries. An entrepreneur from the Adriatic said that Corriere della Sera about this a while ago, it’s not the money, young people find this work demeaning.
In Ostia, the death of the 82-year-old was enough for some people. They put up red and white barrier tape in front of that beach. “Danger” they wrote on a sign: in the face of incompetent administrators “we are forced to close access to the beach until it can be used again. The citizens of Rome”. A district councilor is now demanding that at least one ambulance be stationed near the beach at all times. Another thinks that the city of Rome should hire lifeguards all year round, then you can find them. In any case, this season, instead of a lifeguard, there is a sign on some free beaches warning that there is no lifeguard. Of course they are still full.