ROME—Manuela Avondoglio hoped to spend this Christmas with her 79-year-old mother, unlike a year ago. Instead, the resurgence of Covid-19 in Europe means another festive season in isolation.

Ms. Avondoglio and her sister placed their mother, who has Alzheimer’s disease, in a nursing home a few months before the pandemic began. In the beginning, they used to visit her every day and she seemed happy, Ms. Avondoglio said.

But...

ROME—Manuela Avondoglio hoped to spend this Christmas with her 79-year-old mother, unlike a year ago. Instead, the resurgence of Covid-19 in Europe means another festive season in isolation.

Ms. Avondoglio and her sister placed their mother, who has Alzheimer’s disease, in a nursing home a few months before the pandemic began. In the beginning, they used to visit her every day and she seemed happy, Ms. Avondoglio said.

But since the coronavirus swept through northern Italy in early 2020, killing thousands of residents in homes, she has been able to visit her mother only once a week, at best, and can speak to her for half an hour through a glass door. Her mother has stopped smiling or talking, she says.

With Covid-19 cases rising fast in much of Europe, and Italy fighting to slow down the Omicron variant that is accelerating in other parts of the continent, many nursing homes have suspended family visits altogether during the Christmas holidays in a pattern that foreshadows the worst fears of families elsewhere, too.

The care home in Ventimiglia, near Genoa, where Ms. Avondoglio’s mother Gabriella Ferrarese lives, stopped all visits when some staff and residents tested positive. Ms. Avondoglio worries she won’t see her mother until after New Year.

“Without my mother, Christmas isn’t Christmas. It was sacred for us,” Ms. Avondoglio said. She said she didn’t decorate her home for Christmas, something her mother used to love.

Across the country, relatives have often been unable to touch their elderly parents, being told instead to keep a distance of several yards, wear protective gear or see them only through a barrier of glass or plastic. Visitors also usually need to test negative for the virus to enter care homes.

Strict rules for visits and other precautions against Covid-19 have taken a toll on many older Italians’ mental health, leaving them feeling abandoned and depressed.

“My mother hasn’t been the same since Covid arrived,” said Alessandro Azzoni, who chairs an association of relatives of care-home residents called Felicita.

The home where his 76-year-old mother lives in the northern Italian town of Pavia allows him to hold his mother’s hand when he visits her, but he can see her only for around 20 minutes every three weeks, Mr. Azzoni said. “This is far from sufficient,” he said.

Doctors say contact with family helps keep the oldest members of society healthier for longer.

As the U.S. and other countries fight Omicron, scientists in South Africa are starting to get a clearer picture. WSJ visited a leading lab studying the coronavirus strain, which appears to partially evade vaccines, is more infectious, and might cause milder symptoms. Photo: Waldo Swiegers/Bloomberg The Wall Street Journal Interactive Edition

“For people that age, seeing their loved ones is in most cases the only reason to live,” said Damiano Rizzi, a psychologist who works with the elderly. “If we deprive them of the affection of their loved ones, they start to lose interest in life and that leads to depression.”

Care-home managers say they have no choice but to limit the number of visits and apply strict distancing protocols to protect residents, staff and also the visiting relatives. Many homes have bought tablet devices to facilitate more-frequent video calls.

“We are in a different world compared with two years ago. Now, with Omicron and more infections, we cannot do otherwise,” said Luca Degani, an official at Uneba, Italy’s national association of nursing homes.

Mr. Degani says many homes are also struggling with a shortage of nurses and other care workers, many of whom have left to work in hospitals, which have hired thousands of extra staff during the pandemic.

Covid-19 infections and deaths in Italy’s care homes have decreased drastically this year.

Photo: Sergio Agazzi/IPA via ZUMA

Care-home residents and workers were among the first groups to be vaccinated in Italy in early 2021. By mid-September, 94% of residents were fully vaccinated, according to Italy’s government.

Covid-19 infections and deaths in Italy’s care homes have decreased drastically this year compared with 2020. But the authorities still fear a heavy toll this winter. In October, Italy made vaccination mandatory for all employees of nursing homes. Staff and residents have been getting booster jabs in recent weeks.

Some homes have relaxed their rules for visits. At the nursing home in Sanfront, a small town near Turin, residents can go out for two hours a week with relatives, can receive half-hour visits several days a week, and will be allowed to visit their families for half a day at Christmas, says the facility’s manager Silvio Ferrato.

“I realize it’s still too little, but that’s the most we can do right now,” he said.

Even among older Italians who don’t live in care homes, caution has reduced contact with family and friends. Many elderly people are scared to leave home for fear of infection, despite widespread vaccinations. Older people who live on their own have been particularly deprived of human contact and social activity since early 2020.

“There is a generalized paralyzing fear. Carrying out day-to-day activities has become very difficult for them. Going out, to begin with. The result is that they stay home to protect themselves,” said Dr. Rizzi, the psychologist.

In the parish of Sant’Anna on the outskirts of Rome, volunteers who assist older people living alone have had to reduce their periodic visits. Many of the volunteers are themselves retirees and are scared to continue such visits for fear of getting infected themselves, says Anna Allevato, a member of a local volunteers’ association.

“The result is that these people, who are already lonely, are even more lonely now,” Ms. Allevato said. The parish has canceled its traditional Christmas lunch and game of bingo for the second year in a row.

Anna Girardi, a 72-year-old retiree from Rome, has stopped going to the theater; attending courses in German, music and art history; or even venturing out on her own to see churches and monuments in Italy’s capital city.

Until the pandemic began, Ms. Girardi used to help children from socially disadvantaged families with their school homework. “I miss them so much,” she said. “I feel much more isolated now. I hope all this ends soon.”

Write to Giovanni Legorano at giovanni.legorano@wsj.com