Infected Italian priest dies after giving respirator to younger coronavirus patient

An Italian priest infected with coronavirus gave up a respirator his parishioners bought for him to a younger patient — and then died from the deadly bug, according to reports.

Reverend Giuseppe Berardelli, 72, refused to take the respirator while in a hospital after finding out the other patient — who was a complete stranger — also needed it, BBC reported.

The main priest in the town of Casnigo died last week in Lovere hospital, the broadcaster said, citing hospital officials.

He was one of at least 60 priests who died in Italy this month as the European nation was the epicenter of the deadly pandemic.

“He is a ‘Martyr of Charity,’” New York Jesuit priest James Martin said on Twitter, adding the biblical phrase, “Greater love has no person…”

Fr. Giuseppe Berardelli, a 72-year-old priest who gave a respirator (that his parishioners had purchased for him), to a younger patient (whom he did not know), has died from #coronavirus.

"Greater love has no person…" (Jn 15:13) https://t.co/qXQ6knoE6n via @Araberara pic.twitter.com/uKxRNghire

— James Martin, SJ (@JamesMartinSJ) March 24, 2020

Martin — an author who edits the Jesuit Journal America — said Berardelli was a “saint like St. Maximilian Kolbe, who in Auschwitz volunteered to take the place of a condemned man with a family, and was killed.”