Should I travel to Italy in April.

If you look at the Italy forum here, you'll see many threads on this subject.

We are in the same situation and are holding tight for now. We are waiting to see of our travel company cancels and gives a refund. If you cancel at this late date you may not get any refund.

If the situation remains as it is (most of the cases in northern Italy) we will go on the tour.

A few of us are booked to go in May and emailed the company. This was their response.
We are closely following the Coronavirus situation in Italy, as you undoubtedly are too. It has always been the Rick Steves tour philosophy to travel without fear – but also to travel smartly and safely. As of February 24, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has recommended that older adults and those with chronic medical conditions consider postponing nonessential travel to Italy.

As a tour operator, we put our travelers’ safety first. At the same time, we owe it to you not to overreact to headline-generated anxiety. As of today, we are still planning to operate all of our tours. Since we don’t know how the situation will change over the next few months, we are making decisions based on what the status is currently and how it affects our upcoming tours (right now we’re addressing March and April departures to Italy). If you’d like to cancel your tour and travel at another time you can do that and get a credit for your deposits. You can also transfer to an alternate tour in 2020. If you have any concerns about your upcoming tour, and for updates on the situation as it affects our tours, please visit our FAQ at https://www.ricksteves.com/tours/coronavirus-faq.

It seems much too early to cancel, unless there's a huge financial difference between cancelling now and cancelling later. Who know what the situation will be in April. We're going to France in mid-April, and I think the only way we'd cancel is if there was some kind of quarantine.

We just booked a trip to Italy for September. Life is full of risk and most people are very poor at risk assessment. Some of the most risky actions are ignored and sometime the least risky are raised to a 10. Only you can decide what is an acceptable level of risk for yourselves. Many here, self include, will continue to pursue normal travel activities until a proven risk is well demonstrated and then we might change our minds. At the moment I see no problems or potential problems for Sicily in April. Personally I would go without hesitation but that is me and not you. As for other travelers -- some are cancelling and others are going so that doesn't prove anything. However, I am a VNam era veteran so I probably have a more fatalistic view of life. Good luck with your decision.

PS Stock market is down record amount today -- over 10% since the fall started so we now know what the money people think. If it drops more then the decision might be that I cannot afford to go instead of a virus concern. This is going to get very messy.

What are the cancellation policies for your hotels? How many days notice do they want to cancel without any charges? We had a couple of hotels in Sicily that we cancelled the day before or day of due to bad weather in that area.

We are doing the RS Sicily tour in early May and then the Best of Southern Italy immediately after. We are not canceling our plans.

Edited to add - as of Feb. 28 the CDC has raised the travel alert to level 3. We are still hanging tight and going forward with our plans to go to Italy in May. So far RS has acted responsibly and canceled tours departing March 1 to March 15 in response to this new threat alert. We are still hoping that things will change in Italy by May but feel confident that RS will continue to do the right thing for its tour participants if the Coronavirus situation remains the same or worsens. If our trip is canceled we will be really sad as we have been looking forward to these tours for months. Our hearts are breaking for the Italian people dealing with this illness and the financial losses that will result to the tourism industry.

I am considering cancelling our trip to Sicily beginning March 17. More concerned about bringing the virus back to elderly in nursing home where my mother is living as well as sites being closed. Is anyone else scheduled for the March 17 Sicily trip and what are your plans?

The CDC has just raised the Alert Level for Italy to Level 3, no nonessential travel. RST has cancelled all trips to Italy leaving Mar 1-15.

We are Southern Italy in May, not looking to promising. The wait, is going to be frustrating.

Hello Christine, You could think to change the dates of Your trip. You have chosen a destination that You can visit even till November. In Sicily the climate it's very very good. I will suggest to ask for the possibility of changing your dates. You Could choose to go in Sicily for example en October. Normally in October it's warmer than April.