Within five years, Rome’s residents will be able to swim in the Tiber River. That’s the promise made by the city’s mayor, Roberto Gualtieri. Speaking from Expo Osaka, where he participated in an event on the future of the Eternal City, Gualtieri said: “It’s an entirely achievable goal.”

The project, which includes monitoring, analysis, and the interventions necessary to purify the water, will be one of the key points in the mayor’s 2027 re-election campaign. The first meeting of the working group is set for October and will gather institutional representatives along with experts from the academic and scientific communities, including environmental health specialists. Doctors, however, have sounded the first warning. “The health risks associated with pollution in the Tiber and Italy’s inland waters are extremely high. Making the Tiber safe for swimming will require enormous efforts to guarantee citizens’ health,” said Alessandro Miani, president of the Italian Society of Environmental Medicine (SIMA). Regarding costs, Gualtieri clarified that they will not be as high as those in Paris, where pollution levels were much worse. Since July, after a 102-year ban, Parisians have been able to swim again in the Seine thanks to an investment of €1.4 billion.