The website of Lazio, the Italian region that includes Rome, was down on Sunday after being hit by a cyber attack, meaning that people could no longer use it to book a Covid vaccine.
“A hacker attack is underway… all defence and verification operations are ongoing to avoid prolonging the cut in services,” the region said on its Twitter account. “Operations concerning vaccinations may be slowed down.” The region’s website, www.regione.lazio.it, was still down on Sunday morning. The site for booking vaccinations was also unavailable. The highly contagious Delta variant represents about 80 percent of new Covid-19 cases in Lazio, where 66 percent of the adult population has been vaccinated, the regional health commissioner Alessio D’Amato said earlier this week.
Nationwide, 60 percent of the population over 12 years old has been fully vaccinated, with 68.5 million total doses administered, the health ministry’s website said Sunday.