Bodies Are Getting Lost In This City That Has Been Ravaged By The Coronavirus

[Judi Lynn]

Families are being forced to scour hospitals, morgues, and cemeteries in search of their loved ones’ remains in Guayaquil, Ecuador.

Picture of Karla Zabludovsky
Karla Zabludovsky
BuzzFeed News Reporter
Posted on May 5, 2020, at 4:25 p.m. ET

MEXICO CITY — On April 1, Víctor Hugo Orellana placed a wooden crucifix on his mother’s chest and wrapped her body in a thick blanket as a group of government officials waited outside to collect her. Rumors of disappearing remains and mismatched corpse records were going around, and Orellana was worried.

“If our mother’s body is lost, this might help us identify her,” Orellana said during a telephone interview, explaining his thinking that afternoon.

Thirty-five days later, Orellana still doesn’t know where to find the remains of his mother, Célida Piedad Solórzano.

Guayaquil, a coastal city in Ecuador, was the first Latin American city to be brought to its knees by the coronavirus. As public services struggled to keep up with the multiplying number of victims last month, body bags piled up inside local hospitals and cadavers were dumped on sidewalks. People were forced to cohabitate for days with dead relatives before anyone came by to retrieve the bodies.

More:
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/karlazabludovsky/coronavirus-ecuador-guayaquil