Funeral worker concerned about vaccine access
Health officer: No evidence dead will pass on virus
When picking up the body of a deceased COVID-19 positive patient, funeral home employees are required to take similar precautions as frontline health care workers. They sanitize, put on a gown, a mask and gloves before coming into contact with a body, but they are not considered frontline caregivers and do not currently have the option to get vaccinated.
When Humboldt County received its first round of Pfizer vaccines, Bill Stiles asked his boss at Ayres Family Cremation in Eureka when their employees would have access to the vaccine.
“( My employer) got in touch with the Humboldt County Department of Health and Human Services and they told him there are no provisions in the state’s hierarchy of (vaccine distribution) to deal with the funeral
home workers,” Stiles said. “There’s a clause in there that says if you transport patients you’re in the first tier and you should get a shot but they don’t consider dead people patients.”
Stiles contacted DHHS for more information on why he would be excluded from phase one, as he comes into regular contact with COVID-positive patients.
“An employee called me back and she said the same thing. She said there are no provisions for (funeral home workers) but it seemed to her that I should get a shot because I’m obviously in contact with COVID-19,” Stiles said. “I’ve been at Granada picking up COVID deaths, I’ve got my mask and gloves on but I’d still like to get a shot.”
The California Department of Public Health’s phase one of vaccine distribution prioritizes “persons at risk of exposure to…COVID-19 through their work in any role in direct health care or long-term care settings. This includes persons at direct risk of exposure in their non- clinical roles, including but not limited to environmental services, patient transport or interpretation.” The CDPH includes residents of skilled nursing facilities, assisted living facilities and similar long-term care settings for older and medically vulnerable people as well.
“I haven’t seen specific guidance on people who work with COVID positive bodies,” said Humboldt County Health Officer Dr. Ian Hoffman on Tuesday. “We do have guidance for the three tiers in phase 1a and those three tiers do include in tier three laboratory workers, so I assume we will put them with that tier three.”
Dr. Hoffman said he said he is not aware of any studies or solid evidence that suggests the deceased are capable of passing along the virus after death.
“We do have recommendations for use of PPE with a body that’s COVID positive and all of those folks should be versed in that and should be using full PPE,” he said
The National Association of Medical Examiners agreed that the chance of COVID-19 transmission between the dead and the living is slim.
“The risk for droplet transmission of COVID-19 after death is thought to be minimal,” said the National Association of Medical Examiners in a statement. “A recent publication suggests that the virus survives longer on surfaces ( hours to days) than previously believed. Medical Examiners and Coroners are familiar with handing bodies that have other viral diseases, such as HIV and Hepatitis, diseases that likely pose more risk at autopsy than COVID-19.”
COVID- 19 spreads mainly from person- toperson, typically through respiratory droplets from coughing, sneezing or talking. However, Stiles believes transmission is possible as he has previously seen bodies of the deceased exhale.
“The first thing I do when I pick up a patient is cover their face with a mask or a towel because a dead body can still exhale when they are moved from their bed to a gurney,” Stiles said. “It happens occasionally, not often, but sometimes you can hear a little breath. I don’t think we’re really high-risk as long as we’re careful and I’m very careful.”
Stiles said he is also concerned about contracting COVID while picking up a body from the deceased’s home.
“A friend of mine who works for another funeral home did get COVID but he didn’t get it from a dead body, he got it from the family of a person he went to pick up. Somebody in the house was exposed,” Stiles said.
Throughout the conversation, Stiles acknowledged that he is not facing the same risk as frontline health care workers and understands why he and other funeral home employees are lower on the totem pole.
“I’m way lower risk than ICU nurses or ICU doctors, I understand that and I’m not advocating that I need to be at the top of the list, but maybe they should at least think about it,” Stiles said.
Stiles noted that his opinion does not necessarily reflect that of his employer. Ayres Family Cremation did not return the Times-Standard’s request for comment before the print deadline.