KEVON FELMINE

kevon.felmine@guardian.co.tt

With the Gov­ern­ment re­lent­ing on its ban on open-air pyre cre­ma­tions for COVID-19 vic­tims, Dass Fu­ner­al Home hopes to car­ry out its first cre­ma­tion site fu­ner­al by Sun­day.

Man­ag­ing Di­rec­tor Car­lyle Mulchan told Guardian Me­dia the com­pa­ny had over 30 bod­ies at its Mara­bel­la branch yes­ter­day.

With the re­sump­tion of fu­ner­als for COVID-19 vic­tims at cre­ma­tion sites, he said Dass could clear its stor­age in a week or two.

Mulchan said the Shore of Peace at South Oropouche could host 10 cre­ma­tions per day, while the Ca­roni Cre­ma­tion Site can do sev­en and the Wa­ter­loo Cre­ma­tion Site, five. There are al­so sites in Mafek­ing in Ma­yaro and Fe­lic­i­ty in Ch­agua­nas. 

Mulchan says bod­ies con­tin­ue to pile up at fu­ner­al homes across the coun­try be­cause of the high COVID-19 death rate. In De­cem­ber, the com­pa­ny in­stalled a 24-foot reefer con­tain­er with a ca­pac­i­ty of just over 40 corpses. It came as the de­mand for cre­ma­to­ri­um ser­vices cre­at­ed a pile-up.

Mulchan said it was com­mend­able that the gov­ern­ment took the re­spon­si­ble ap­proach. How­ev­er, he be­lieves it was a bit late as the sci­ence sup­port­ed that open-air pyre cre­ma­tions could work safe­ly. He said it was un­for­tu­nate that the mat­ter had to reach the court when it on­ly need­ed the stroke of a pen.

“We would have elim­i­nat­ed this whole is­sue if this was im­ple­ment­ed ear­li­er. You see, we were look­ing at it as a Hin­du/East In­di­an is­sue when the fact is that it was a na­tion­al is­sue where we give the na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty the op­por­tu­ni­ty to choose a method of dis­pos­al rather than the cre­ma­to­ri­um. We def­i­nite­ly could not han­dle the sit­u­a­tion, but buri­als are eas­i­er. Now we are see­ing that the ceme­ter­ies are be­ing filled,” Mulchan said.

Not on­ly will peo­ple not wait weeks to say good­bye to their dead, Mulchan said it will al­so knock off be­tween $5,000-$6,000 in cre­ma­to­ri­um ex­pens­es. It is an ex­pense that many fam­i­lies strug­gled to pay since the gov­ern­ment im­ple­ment­ed the ban. Pun­dit Satyanand Ma­haraj, Spir­i­tu­al Head Satya Anand Ashram in Aranguez, is ques­tion­ing how the State will com­pen­sate those who paid ex­or­bi­tant fees. Ma­haraj said the State has not yet proven why it stopped open-air pyre cre­ma­tions.

“The WHO has nev­er rec­om­mend­ed the ban­ning of open-air cre­ma­tion and recog­nis­ing cul­tur­al and re­li­gious prac­tices. To­day we have more COVID-19 deaths than any oth­er time, yet the Gov­ern­ment would have us be­lieve it is in their benev­o­lence that we find re­lief when, in fact, they have in­flict­ed un­told hard­ship on the Hin­du Com­mu­ni­ty. Mean­while, rivers re­main closed for re­li­gious pur­pos­es,” Ma­haraj said.

He wel­comed the re­moval of the ban, say­ing that the Hin­du and oth­er com­mu­ni­ties that pre­fer open-air pyre cre­ma­tions as the pre­ferred means of dis­pos­al of their de­ceased could now breathe a col­lec­tive breath of re­lief.

He thanked the Gov­ern­ment for lis­ten­ing to the voice of the peo­ple.

Now that open-air pyre cre­ma­tions for COVID-19 vic­tims might ease stor­age is­sues, is there a need for the pro­posed mass stor­age fa­cil­i­ty for COVID-19 corpses? 

The As­so­ci­a­tion of Fu­ner­al Pro­fes­sion­als cre­at­ed a stir when it chose Freeport as the home for this fa­cil­i­ty.

How­ev­er, the as­so­ci­a­tion with­drew the pro­pos­al af­ter re­jec­tion from the res­i­dents.

As­so­ci­a­tion pres­i­dent Kei­th Bel­grove said yes­ter­day that there was no up­date. Mulchan be­lieves a fa­cil­i­ty to house on­ly COVID-19 corpses is a good idea. 

Hos­pi­tal mor­tu­ar­ies are un­der pres­sure with COVID-19 corpses, and Mulchan be­lieves this stor­age site would help pro­tect the lives of the hos­pi­tal staff, mor­tu­ary at­ten­dants and their fam­i­lies.