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A funeral home staff member in personal protective equipment prepares a grave for a Covid-19 related burial.
- Leading funeral homes in the Eastern Cape are running out of coffins as funerals are held every day of the week due to Covid-19.
- The demand for oversized caskets has increased rapidly due to a growing number of overweight or obese people succumbing to the virus.
- Avbob says it has converted shipping containers into mobile morgues to meet demand at 19 branches in South Africa.
Leading funeral homes in the Eastern Cape are running out of caskets as funerals are held every day of the week, rather than once a week, due to the increasing death rate from Covid-19.
On Monday night, President Cyril Ramaphosa placed the country on a tight Level 3 lockdown and warned that the number of new coronavirus infections was increasing at an unprecedented rate.
Demand for oversized caskets has risen rapidly due to a growing number of overweight and obese people succumbing to the virus, Nomtshongwana Funeral Undertakers owner Vusi Nomtshongwana said.
“Since last month, I order two oversized caskets per week, whereas normally I would order one oversized casket once every six months,” he said.
People with comorbidities, such as obesity, are at risk of dying from Covid-19, the health department previously said.
Nomtshongwana Funeral Undertakers, a respected Mdantsane-based funeral home in the Buffalo City metro, has been serving much of the metro since its establishment in 1978.
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“I find that I need more caskets, a total of 20 caskets per week, whereas before Covid-19, I only needed 10 caskets per week. The workload has doubled and even tripled. We perform funeral services on a daily basis, whereas before Covid, we would conduct funeral services on the weekends, ”the funeral home said.
Avobob Funeral Service has its own factory based in Bloemfontein that manufactures and distributes caskets to hundreds of funeral homes across the country, including its 23 branches in the Eastern Cape.
The general manager of corporate affairs, Adriaan Bester, confirmed that the demand for caskets had increased.
“We use 140% more coffins than last December,” he said.
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“We have good amounts of stock at our branches across the country, but we can replenish that stock at our factory on short notice. We also provide stock to other undertakers.”
Bester also revealed that they had increased their mortuary capacity by converting shipping containers into cold rooms at 19 branches across the country.
“In some areas, our box load has grown by more than 100%. We have placed mobile container morgues at 19 sites across the country and have more units available should the need arise,” he said.
Johann Rossouw, president of the Funeral Industry Reformed Association (FIRA), which represents 30,000 small funeral homes and 80,000 employees, said FIRA would seek to help salons facing a critical shortage of caskets in the Eastern Cape.
“We have alternative options and people within our networks who could help in the short term if there is a problem within the Eastern Cape in terms of a shortage of caskets.”
