Italian PM calls special meeting to discuss virus

Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte called for a meeting Tuesday of all Italian government ministers and regional governors to come up with a coordinated plan for coping with the spread of the new coronavirus across the country.

Speaking to reporters ahead of the meeting he acknowledged that regions have been handling the emergency situation with different measures creating "confusion" and noted that on Tuesday they hope to come up with a coordinated protocol for the country.

Italy's southern island of Sicily reported a positive case of new coronavirus on Tuesday, evidence that the virus is spreading amid finger-pointing about the origins of the crisis that has made Italy ground zero of the outbreak in Europe.

The positive test in Sicily was from a woman vacationing from Italy's northern Lombardy region, which has registered the vast majority of Italy's cases.

She and her husband were put in isolation, and officials were tracing their contacts to try to contain the spread, the regional government said.

Italy has closed schools, museums and theaters and canceled Venice's Carnival and Masses in the two regions where clusters have formed _ Lombardy and Veneto.

Police and soldiers are enforcing quarantines around a cluster of 10 towns in Lombardy and the epicenter of the Veneto cluster, Vo'Euganeo.

So far in Italy 229 people have tested positive for the virus and seven have died.

Also on Tuesday a tourist hotel on the Canary Island hotel of Tenerife was placed in quarantine after an Italian doctor staying there tested positive for the new virus. The islands off Africa are a popular destination for Italians.