On 4 March, Emilia-Romagna's regional minister of health, Raffaele Donini, and minister for territories, Barbara Lori, were declared positive to COVID-19 test
On 9 March, Giovanni Malagò, president of the Italian Olympic Committee, announced that all sports events in Italy would be canceled until at least April 3. The ban does not cover Italian clubs or international games.
On 19 March, Italy overtook China as the country with the most coronavirus-related deaths in the world after reporting 3,405 fatalities from the pandemic.
As of 26 March 2020, there were 80,589 confirmed cases, 8,215 deaths and 10,361 recoveries in Italy, with the majority of those cases occurring in the Lombardy region.