National Post (National Edition)
The way we do funerals needs changing
On March 25, Newfoundland and Labrador’s chief medical officer of health, Janice Fitzgerald, reported that the province had identified 67 presumptive cases of COVID-19. Two-thirds of them (44) were traced to a single event: a funeral in St. John’s last week. Numerous Canada Post workers attended it, to pay their respects to a colleague’s loved one. Subsequently, a mail processing plant that employs nearly 300 was ordered to shut down.
Attendees of funerals during the 2003 SARS epidemic in Toronto similarly had to be quarantined, after people with symptoms attended the services, in defiance of posted signs asking them to stay away.
As a historian of medicine living in Ontario at the time, I was not surprised. Virtually every early modern English plague regulation was broken at one point or another: 17th-century Nottinghamshire men defied quarantine to play football, Winchester crowds assembled to watch bull-baiting in 1593. But past epidemics have shown that restrictions on funeral practices have proven to be among the most commonly resisted regulations during quarantines.
As plague historian Paul Slack put it, “The interference of government was most deeply resented when it disturbed the customs surrounding death.” Funerals were (and still are) communal events. Church bells sounded throughout the parish whenever someone died. Neighbours assembled in often large processions to accompany the casket to its gravesite.
It was precisely because funerals entailed large groups of people that governments tried to police them during epidemics, in the name of what we’re today calling “social distancing.” These proved to be among the most difficult policies to enforce. In 1603, for example, the London marshal ordered that the numbers present at plague burials be limited to six. He failed spectacularly, with reports of attacks on officers who tried to enforce the order.
Funerals held profound cultural relevance back then, just as they do today. Families and neighbours felt strongly that their loved ones should receive a customary burial, which meant that time-honoured ceremonies must be upheld. The size of a funeral procession or lavishness of a funeral dinner reflected upon one’s social standing and community ties.
Consider the historical parallels between 1636 London, when 11 musicians were jailed for marching behind a casket “with trumpets sounded and swords drawn,” and modern New Orleans, where police recently issued arrest warrants for the organizers of a traditional “second line” (a jazz procession that follows a casket), which was in direct defiance of city ordinances.
Slack also argues that the psychological importance of funerals in such times of crisis is profound, as many feel the need to attend funerals as a way of confronting their fears and defying death.
Whether these were the reasons the Canada Post workers attended the funeral of their colleague’s loved one in St. John’s is uncertain. However, data suggests that Canadians, like people the world over, are now entering a frightening period in which deaths from COVID-19 will escalate. Communities from coast to coast are going to lose loved ones.
Recent epidemics have demonstrated that addressing customary funerary practices presents public health workers with a sensitive and complicated task. Epidemiologists found that burial practices in some West African communities, which can include loved ones washing and preparing bodies for burial, probably exacerbated the 2013-2016 Ebola epidemic. In response, the WHO, in collaboration with affected communities, developed new protocols for safe and dignified burials that try to recognize the need for family and religious engagement. However, this involves an extremely delicate balancing act.
Public health officials and civic leaders should be proactive in preparing Canadians now for the fact that funeral customs will have to change in the coming weeks and months. There have already been instances of families hosting virtual celebrations of life and many will have to use similar means to mourn the death of their loved ones. While it is hardly a fun thought, it is better to confront this issue now than amidst the flood of emotions that accompanies loss.
Kevin Siena is a professor of history at Trent University who specializes in the history of infectious diseases. His most recent book is Rotten Bodies: Class and Contagion in Eighteenth-Century Britain.
COMMUNITIES FROM COAST TO COAST ARE GOING TO LOSE LOVED ONES. — KEVIN SIENA