Anonymous wrote:Can we ban funerals for those over 60 until the COVID surge is over? It's more important to grieve young people and they deserve first dibs on the funeral resources

WTF?

— hospice mom

This is a morbid thought, but can you catch the virus from a dead body? If so, we may not be able to bury.

Anonymous wrote:Can we ban funerals for those over 60 until the COVID surge is over? It's more important to grieve young people and they deserve first dibs on the funeral resources

Can we ban funerals for those over 60 until the COVID surge is over? It's more important to grieve young people and they deserve first dibs on the funeral resources

I just lost a family member who had been residing in a nursing home and we had to have the funeral very quickly. The funeral home director asked us to do an immediate burial, but we pleaded for more time. Thankfully they agreed, but the protocols and restrictions changed drastically in the interim...which was only about 4 days. We were not able to have many guests, the few that we had were required to rotate in for the viewing, there were only about 5 chairs in the parlor which were placed at least 8 ft apart and they only wanted 2-3 people at the casket at a time. The funeral director said that we were lucky to be able to have any type of service because in the coming days, immediate burials would be the only option available. This was in DC.

My family member was a veteran, but we learned from the VA (a day before the funeral) that military honors had been suspended indefinitely, so we lost out on having that too. This is so hard, but I fear it'll get worse before it gets better.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You do a graveside service with a few people. And then months afterwards you can do a celebration of life. It’s my understanding that these bodies are cremated

I don't think you can do a celebration of life in person. We will have a short period of time when the virus dies down and we can resume a little bit of normal, but it is not a good idea to ask people to ttravel and show up in a large group. You will still need precautions. Then come fall to late fall we will likely be social distancing again. I think zoom or something like that is the way to go.

Why can't you do a celebration of life? We acknowledge some of our relatives passing at 6 or 12 months. That's a good time to do it.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Soon you will be required to cremate and they won't hold bodies for burial at a later date. We don't have the capacity.

Are you guessing or basing that on something you have information about?

Wuhan held all the ashes, and didn't release any until recently.

Can't imagine how that's going.

My dad died in Jan and we are in New England so the ground was frozen so no burials. We had funeral and burial in summer. He was cremated though so that simplified things.

A memorial later

People in colder climates are use to this. Example - Burial can not happen when the ground is frozen. You wait. If a death happens in the Winter, you wait till Spring

Op, you accept that people have to be flexible with plans

I work in funeral service. Most funeral homes have rapidly mobilized to have the ability to live stream funerals on Facebook live and Youtube Live. The only people present at the service are immediate family and speakers.

Another option is delaying the service, as mentioned above. Traditional funerals and burials are available for COVID-19 victims at this time. Most are choosing cremation. If your loved one dies of something else, rest assured traditional burial is an option, with the remote/under 10 persons at the service.

Anonymous wrote:I'm the mother of a kid on hospice, so this has been on my mind too.

We are Catholic, and at this point the archdiocese we live in is allowing funerals with immediate family only. However, I can't imagine a funeral without his aunts and uncles and other people who have loved and supported him throughout his life.

My very tentative thought is that if he dies while people are sheltering in place, and there are restrictions, that we will come together as a family by Zoom and pray and grieve, but that we will cremate his body and wait to hold a funeral mass and a celebration of his life and a burial when we can be together. Not an easy choice, but I think that's better than not giving people a chance to be there.

We will all be with you in spirit. God bless you and your child.

Anonymous wrote:You do a graveside service with a few people. And then months afterwards you can do a celebration of life. It’s my understanding that these bodies are cremated

I don't think you can do a celebration of life in person. We will have a short period of time when the virus dies down and we can resume a little bit of normal, but it is not a good idea to ask people to ttravel and show up in a large group. You will still need precautions. Then come fall to late fall we will likely be social distancing again. I think zoom or something like that is the way to go.

My dad died last week out of state (not coronavirus). We are having him cremated and will do a memorial service at some point in the future. It's been a horrible situation all around, with the inability to travel, be together, have seen him at the hospital, etc.

It depends on the burial. For a cremation, you can cremate and if you do, go to a cremation place not funeral home as its much cheaper.

We just did a burial and waited a few weeks. Did the cremation and did a grave side service a few weeks later. We kept it simple.

No. Both my parents want to be cremated and have celebrations of life. So theoretically that could be done at any time.