[Watch] Families Forced To Search For Remains Of Kin Themselves As COVID-19 Deaths Pile In Mortuary

Shocking video footage has reportedly surfaced online showing relatives of COVID-19 victims being forced to search and try to identify their own kin from a pile of bodies in Theni Government Hospital’s mortuary in Tamil Nadu, India.

The remains of those who passed away due to COVID-19 were reportedly left piled up haphazardly in a room, with the deceased's family members asked to enter the mortuary and identify and collect the corpse of their kin themselves, without the supervision of health workers.

The incident came to light after the family of a 47-year-old Theni man, who succumbed to COVID-19 complications on June 1, took photos of the scene after being instructed to retrieve his remains on their own from the at-capacity mortuary.

The family was allegedly directed by mortuary staff to enter the facility and open up makeshift body bags to search, identify, and collect their loved one's body themselves. The relatives were reportedly shocked to see bodies left in piles at the mortuary, with most of the remains wrapped in blue plastic bags used as provisional bags for cadavers, reported News18.

Several other families surfaced with similar claims against the hospital's mortuary staff. The horrifying visual has gone viral after the photos were shared on social media.

Some of the photos show family members handling the remains of COVID-19 patients themselves without wearing any protective gear, going against the Health Ministry’s strict protocols for managing novel coronavirus, reported India Today.

“The corpses of COVID-19 victims are properly handed over to their kin and action will be taken after investigation on the incident. I have also ordered the organization to dismiss the contract employee on duty during the incident,” said Dean Balaji Nathan of Theni Government Hospital.

An initial investigation has proven at least three staff members to be at fault for the gruesome incident. The security guard on duty has reportedly been suspended while departmental action has been taken against the two mortuary attendants, Republic World reported.

"For COVID-19, we have two rooms. The room sizes are small. The COVID-19 bodies have been separated from non-COVID-19 bodies that require postmortem. These were normal rooms where only three bodies can be kept, but at times 15 bodies are accumulated overnight," Nathan stated.

The hospital official further said that the corpses were piled up because there's inadequate space inside the mortuary with the facility mounting an ongoing expansion of the morgue by building a rack system to house more bodies in a systematic way, The Independent reported.

Theni Government Hospital, which has around 700 beds is reportedly witnessing an average of 10-12 deaths per day. Nathan added that about 60 suspected and 30 COVID-19 positive patients are admitted to the hospital every day on average.

After a tremendous surge of more than 400,000 covid cases in a day, India’s devastating second wave of coronavirus appears to have slowed down. The country is still reporting more than 100,000 covid cases a day and almost 3,000 daily deaths as of Tuesday, June 1. Meanwhile, Tamil Nadu clocked its highest daily infection rate with 26,500 infections on Tuesday.