Ecuadorian families are struggling to bury the corpses of those who have fallen to the coronavirus as the country’s funeral system has been overwhelmed and essentially collapsed under the sheer weight of bodies. Several families have been forced to keep their loved ones’ bodies in their homes or on the sidewalks in front of their homes for days as authorities told them it would take several days before an ambulance could come to collect the bodies.
Ecuador’s fragile health system has been overwhelmed by the COVID-19 crisis. While it is suspected that the majority of these people died due to the coronavirus, a lack of testing means that this cannot be confirmed in many cases.
Funeral parlors, hospitals, and morgues are unable to deal with the rising number of deaths. Local media in the port city of Guayaquil, for example, report that municipal authorities are tasked with collecting hundreds of bodies from the streets. There are also shortages of wooden coffins, resulting in people using cardboard boxes donating by cemeteries.
In Guayaquil, the morgues are full and ‘unclaimed bodies’ are stacking up at hospitals and clinics. Several funeral homes are refusing to take bodies due to fear of contagion from the coronavirus. Guayaquil is located in the province of Guayas, which accounts for roughly 70% of Ecuador’s COVID-19 cases.
In response to the mounting crisis, Guayaquil Mayor Cynthia Viteri, who herself tested positive for the virus, said that the city had received several refrigerated containers to “deposit the bodies of those who died inside a hospital or in their homes”. Viteri has admitted that the city was “unprepared”, adding that “nobody believed that what we saw in Wuhan, people falling dead in the streets, would ever happen here”. She added that Guayaquil was particularly vulnerable due to its air links to Europe, as a result of which Ecuador’s “patient zero” was an Ecuadorian woman who arrived from Spain.
Simultaneously, Ecuadorian President Lenin Moreno announced that the city is building emergency cemeteries. Last week, the government began storing bodies in refrigerated containers until graves were dug, and is aiming to bury roughly 100 people a day.
Ecuador has close to 7900 cases, with 388 deaths. However, given the lack of testing, both of these figures could be much higher than what is being reported.
Ecuador’s Funeral System Overwhelmed, Bodies Piling up on the Streets
Funeral parlors, hospitals, and morgues are unable to deal with the number of bodies.
April 16, 2020
IMAGE SOURCE: VICENTE GAIBOR DEL PINO / REUTERS