International charity workers are breathing a sigh of relief as they pack up a field hospital in one of Italy's hardest hit regions — and head home as honorary citizens of the coronavirus-battered city. "I would definitely say it was a war," says Bev Kauffeldt, the Canadian team leader for Samaritan's Purse, an evangelical humanitarian organization that sent doctors, nurses and other medical staff to fight the pandemic in Cremona, in northern Italy's Lombardy region.

Since March, the group, which has several Canadian members, has treated an overflow of nearly 300 patients from the city's local hospital, where most other medical services were suspended due to the strain the coronavirus has put on the facility.