Family of COVID-19 take body to street to protest delayed burial

– The deceased had died a week ago in Bolivia and his body had been preserved at his home which the family deemed unsafe for them

– They thus took the coffin to the street to protest his delayed burial and funeral workers came and collected it a few hours later

– A police colonel said law enforcers were collecting more than 17 bodies a day and its workforce was already stretched

– The country’s ministry of labour said an addition 250 burial plots were being prepared to accommodate the high number of deaths in Bolivia

A desperate family in Bolivia has taken the body of its kin who succumbed to COVID-19 to the street to protest the delayed burial of the victim.

The deceased is said to have lost his battle to COVID-19 on Sunday, June 28, and his remains were at his home the whole week.

According to Evening Express, one of the neighbours of the aggrieved family said they deemed the preservation of the body as way too risky for the other members.

Their efforts bore fruits after funeral workers turned up some hours later and took the coffin to a cemetery.

In his defence, Police Colonel Ivan Rojas said law enforcers were collecting over 17 bodies a day which he said had stretched the workforce of the police unit and funeral homes.

“The crematorium oven is small, that that is where the bodies are collecting,” said national Labour Minister Oscar Mercado.

Mercado said 250 new burial plots were being prepared in the meantime to accommodate the growing number of dead bodies.

The country has so far recorded 36,818 confirmed cases of the deadly virus and 1,320 deaths.

Its neighbour Brazil is one of the worst-hit countries with more than 1.6 million cases of the virus and 64, 867 cases of the disease.

United States of America is the most hit country with more than 2.9 million cases and 132,534 deaths.