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Possible funeral urn shortage in Wuhan, China
The reports call into question the Chinese communist government’s official figures of 2,535 people in Wuhan who have died of the virus, Bloomberg reported on Friday. Trucks shipped in about 2,500 urns on both Wednesday and Thursday to the Wuhan funeral homes, according to Chinese media outlet Caixin. A photo published by Caixin showed 3,500 urns stacked on the ground inside. It’s unclear how many of the urns had been filled. The report noted that people who answered the phone at six of the eight funeral homes in Wuhan said they either did not have data on how many urns were waiting to be collected, or were not authorized to disclose the numbers. Calls were not answered at the other two. Some families said they had been forced to wait for several hours to pick up the ashes. Two locals in Wuhan who have lost family members to the virus said online that they were informed they had to be accompanied by their employers or officials from neighborhood committees when picking up the urns, likely as a measure against public gatherings. "I was told by district government to wait until further notice on when I can pick up my father’s ashes," one Wuhan resident using the name "Xue Zai Shou Zhong," meaning "snow in hand," posted on Weibo. "There is a staggered arrangement for urn collecting." Another Weibo user using the handle Adagier said she lost her husband to the coronavirus and had since been contacted by police warning her not to be too emotional ‐ and to stop posting online. "I have only one demand," she wrote. "I want to give my husband a proper burial as soon as possible." China had reported that its tally of new cases in Wuhan had hit zero and the lockdown in place on the city of 11 million people since January would be lifted. Posted by: Besoeker 2020-03-28 |
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