New York City plans to temporarily bury coronavirus victims in a park
New York City is looking more and more apocalyptic every day.
As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to claim lives in the U.S's coronavirus epicenter, every aspect of city's resources for managing the dead have been overloaded. So to deal with the influx of dead bodies that have overtaken morgues, funeral homes, and cemeteries, the city will soon begin using a park for temporary burials, New York City Councilmember Mark Levine announced Monday.
Levine, the chair of the council's health committee, explained in a Monday tweet thread how the city's Office of the Chief Medical Examiner is "now dealing with the equivalent of an ongoing 9/11." Deaths in hospitals are dramatically rising, but so are the numbers of deaths in homes; 20–25 people are usually reported dead in their homes every day in New York City, but that's risen to 200–215. Overall daily death counts have also doubled.
Grieving families report calling as many as half a dozen funeral homes and finding none that can handle their deceased loved ones.
Cemeteries are not able to handle the number of burial requests and are turning most down. 4/
— Mark D. Levine (@MarkLevineNYC) April 6, 2020
So to avoid "scenes like those in Italy" where bodies have been found on the streets, New York City will likely soon use a park for "temporary interment" where "trenches will be dug for 10 caskets in a line," Levine wrote.
The goal is to avoid scenes like those in Italy, where the military was forced to collect bodies from churches and even off the streets.
OCME is going to need much more staff to achieve that goal. 10/
— Mark D. Levine (@MarkLevineNYC) April 6, 2020
New York City's death toll from coronavirus was nearing 2,500 as of Sunday morning, though Levine noted that a lack of testing means that number is surely an undercount.
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