Covid-19: a mass grave on an island in New York to unclog the morgues
Text by: RFI Follow
With the increase in mortality in New York due to the coronavirus, the city is facing a lack of space to store the remains of the victims and has just activated the measures provided for in its plan for pandemics, by digging a mass grave on Hart Island. For 150 years, the island has served as a burial ground for the poor, prisoners or people whose bodies are not claimed. It is also where the victims of the Spanish flu and AIDS were buried.
Publicity
Read moreWith our correspondent in New York, Carrie Nooten
The image is striking: the first long trench is freshly dug, and we see men in white coveralls piling pine coffins engraved with a name, in two rows and three floors, then cover them again with earth.
The drone that captures the scene is only a few kilometers from the center of Manhattan, it flies over Hart Island, east of the Bronx. The island is reputed to have housed the cemetery of the destitute in the megalopolis for 150 years. It is also planned to receive the victims of an influenza pandemic , in the city's emergency plan created ten years ago.
25 bodies buried per day
It is accessed only by boat. Thus, two days ago, a first barge carrying a refrigerated trailer landed on the island. The city hired workers to dig the trench with backhoes. Usually 25 bodies are buried per week by prisoners from the nearby Rikers prison: New Yorkers whose bodies have not been claimed by relatives or prisoners.
► Also read: Coronavirus: Cheyenne, homeless in New York, more vulnerable than ever
These days, 25 bodies are buried there every day, five days a week. The city did not specify whether they were only victims of the Covid-19. One thing is certain, they were sent there to unclog the city's morgues, which receive twice as many bodies as normal. Families wishing to do so should be able to request the coffins of their loved ones within 15 days to organize private burials.
Newsletter With the Daily Newsletter, find the headlines directly in your mailbox
SubscribeFollow all international news by downloading the RFI application
google-play-badge_FR- United States
- Coronavirus
- Health and Medicine
On the same subject
Coronavirus: Trump press briefings increasingly worry his advisers
Decryption
The United States, the country most affected by the coronavirus pandemic
Coronavirus: Trump threatens to suspend US contribution to WHO