150 abandoned corpses at EKSUTH for mass burial

Ekiti State University Teaching Hospital (EKSUTH)

No fewer than 150 unclaimed corpses at the Ekiti State University Teaching Hospital (EKSUTH) mortuary would be given mass burial, the hospital authorities had said.

Chairman, Medical Advisory Committee of the hospital, Dr Kayode Ajite, made this known in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Tuesday in Ado-Ekiti.

Ajite said that some families abandoned their relatives’ corpses in the hospital morgue, adding that the unclaimed bodies had congested the hospital’s morgue.

He said that some of the corpses were accident victims and armed robbers whose families were not even aware of their whereabouts, adding that it was the reason for the proposed mass burial of the corpses.

Ajite told NAN that management of the hospital would through media announcements give 14 days for owners of the corpses to collect them.

According to him, corpses not collected after the period will be given mass burial.

He said that some parents internationally dumped their children’s corpses in the morgue on grounds that they lacked funds.

“Some parents find it difficult to either pay hospital bill or to transport the corpse, and space to bury the corpse or the trauma of burying their own children, hence the abandonment,” Ajite said.

He appealed to the public to claim their corpses at the hospital’s morgue in order to avoid mass burial.