Unclaimed bodies pile up at Luweero hospital

Authorities at Luweero General Hospital have raised concern over the rising number of unclaimed bodies at the facility.

Most of the unclaimed bodies, according to authorities, are those of victims of road accidents and violent crime. Others are picked up from Luweero Town and other urban areas without any identification documents.

“Currently, we lack a cemetery as a hospital and we usually seek permission from Luweero Town Council for where to bury the unclaimed bodies, including incurring the costs of transport and grave digging. We pray that the district secures funds for an official burial ground,” Mr Robert Lukenge, the hospital administrator, said in an interview on Tuesday.

Luweero General Hospital is located on the Kampala-Gulu highway, which is prone to road accidents and other forms of criminality.

The hospital receives on average of four unclaimed bodies per month and they have to be buried after four days because the mortuary has no refrigeration facilities, according to Mr Lukenge.

The latest incident, according to hospital authorities, involved the unclaimed body of a woman brought to the hospital mortuary by police on December 8. The hospital later buried the remains after her relatives failed to show up in four days.

Mr Patrick Lule, the acting Savannah regional police spokesperson, revealed that their officers, while on patrol on December 8, were notified by the area leaders about a body dumped in Kavule Zone.

“The body had deep cuts on the head. The police transferred the body to Luweero Hospital for a post-mortem,” he said. Meanwhile, authorities at Luweero Town Council have revealed that the public cemetery is almost filled up.

Mr Chris Buwembo, the town council chairperson, explained that while the cemetery land is open to the hospital for use, they have no specific budget for meeting the burial costs.

“I believe that the hospital has a good point to advocate for a specific budget for the burial expenses and land to have a more spacious area for burial of the unclaimed bodies,” he said.

The issue of unclaimed bodies is a growing concern in many districts and urban areas across the country. In 2017, more than 500 bodies were not claimed by relatives or friends in Kampala Metropolitan area, forcing authorities to bury them in a cemetery at Bukasa in Kira Municipality, Wakiso District.

According to officials at Kampala City mortuary, bodies are photographed, laying emphasis on the clothes, identifiable marks such as scars and ornaments they were wearing so that when a relative shows up later, such information guides them on where the deceased was buried .For bodies which could have been buried for more than three months and presumed to have decomposed, officials at the city mortuary say, police use DNA to identify them before handing them to their relatives.