A councilman said NYC is preparing a contingency plan to dig trenches in city parks '10 caskets in a line' to bury people who died of the coronavirus

Advertisement
A councilman said NYC is preparing a contingency plan to dig trenches in city parks '10 caskets in a line' to bury people who died of the coronavirus
new york city coronavirus
  • New York City could start building trenches in a city park to bury the bodies of people who have died from COVID-19 as a contingency plan if the death rate doesn't drop soon, a city councilman said Monday.
  • "The goal is to avoid scenes like those in Italy, where the military was forced to collect bodies from churches and even off the streets," tweeted Mark Levine, the chair of the New York city council health committee.
  • He said hospital morgues typically hold around 15 corpses, and some hospitals have already used two or three additional freezers that can hold around 100 bodies each.
  • A spokesperson for the New York Chief Medical Examiner told BuzzFeed News: "There is currently no plan to inter at city parks at this time."
  • Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

If the death rate from the novel coronavirus doesn't drop soon, New York City could start digging trenches in a city park to temporarily bury the bodies of those who have died from COVID-19, a city councilman said Monday.

Advertisement

"This likely will be done by using a NYC park for burials (yes you read that right)," Mark Levine, the chair of the New York city council health committee, tweeted. "Trenches will be dug for 10 caskets in a line. It will be done in a dignified, orderly - and temporary - manner. But it will be tough for NYers to take."

He added: "The goal is to avoid scenes like those in Italy, where the military was forced to collect bodies from churches and even off the streets."

In a follow-up tweet, Levine clarified that the park burials were a "contingency plan" that would not have to be implemented if the death rate continues to overwhelm city resources.

The Italian military used trucks to transport "dozens of coffins" to cremation sites in the country from the city of Bergamo in northern Italy, the worst-hit city in the country, because local morgues could not handle the number of bodies. At least 15,000 people have died from the disease in Italy, according to Johns Hopkins researchers.

Advertisement

New York's medical examiner said there is no plan to use NYC parks and Gov. Cuomo said he hasn't heard anything about it

"There is currently no plan to inter at city parks at this time," a spokesperson for the New York Chief Medical Examiner told BuzzFeed News' Tasneem Nashrulla.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo similarly said he has "heard nothing about that," NBC News' Allan Smith reported.

"I've heard a lot of wild rumors, but I've heard nothing about the city burying people in parks," Cuomo said during his daily press conference on Monday.

In a series of tweets, Levine explained that the number of bodies has overwhelmed the city's hospitals. Hospital morgues are typically equipped to handle around 15 bodies, he said. The Office of the Chief Medical Examiner has provided 80 extra refrigeration trailers to city hospitals, which can store around 100 bodies. Some hospitals have needed two or three of the trailers, and most trailers are full, he added.

The city councilman said the deaths weren't just coming from the city's overwhelmed hospitals.

Advertisement

"On an average day before this crisis there were 20-25 deaths at home in NYC," he tweeted. "Now in the midst of this pandemic the number is 200-215."

A plan from 2008 calls for the use of prison labor

According to New York City's existing contingency plan for a "biological outbreak," which was created in 2008 over Bird Flu fears, prison labor would be used to dig mass graves to bury victims.

Inmates on Rikers Island would be transported to Hart Island to dig mass graves where the dead could be buried, and cremation efforts would be increased, according to a previous Business Insider report.

Levine did not mention Hart Island or prison labor but instead called for volunteers to help.

"As New York City continues to appeal to the nation for help, we need to ask not just for doctors and nurses and respiratory therapists," he tweeted. "We also need mortuary affairs staff. This is tough to talk about and maybe tough to ask for. But we have no choice. The stakes are too high."

Advertisement

"Deathcare" workers in New York City are "overwhelmed" by the number of bodies of people who have died from COVID-19.

"I don't know how many more bodies I can take," Patrick Marmo, a New York licensed embalmer based in Brooklyn, told Business Insider's Dave Mosher. "No one in the New York City area possibly has enough equipment to care for human remains of this magnitude."

Health and government officials have warned that the next two weeks could be particularly bleak as the number of deaths is expected to rise across the country, but particularly in hotspots like New York. The virus has infected more than 122,000 in the state of New York and killed at least 3,048 people in NYC.

"Nothing matters more in this crisis than saving the living. But we need to face the gruesome reality that we need more resources to manage our dead as well. Or the pain of this crisis will be compounded almost beyond comprehension," Levine tweeted.

Do you have a personal experience with the coronavirus you'd like to share? Or a tip on how your town or community is handling the pandemic? Please email covidtips@businessinsider.com and tell us your story.

Advertisement

And get the latest coronavirus analysis and research from Business Insider Intelligence on how COVID-19 is impacting businesses.

{{}}