04 Aug 2019

The unclaimed bodies of 19 people, 16 of them babies, were on August 2 buried at Gaborone’s Ledumang Cemetery in a joint Princess Marina Hospital and Ministry of Health and Wellness operation.

In an interview, Minister Dr Alfred Madigele said the figure was unprecedented as in the past not more than two unknown deceased persons had to be buried by health authorities.

“The number has never been this high,” he said.

Dr Madigele said the 19 bodies, comprising mostly abandoned infants who later died at the hospital and still born babies, had been lying in the facility’s mortuary since May/June last year.

He said authorities decided to bury the corpses because they were congesting the hospital mortuary.

Noting that Princess Marina Hospital was a referral facility and always busy, Dr Madigele said keeping the bodies for the past 14 months had therefore negatively affected operations.

“We had to consult with the district commissioner and figure a way forward in seeing that the bodies are buried soonest because the hospital could not keep them any longer,” he said.

The minister observed that some people habitually stayed away from their homes for prolonged periods without communicating with families and when they died, their deaths remained unknown as relatives saw nothing unusual about their non-communication.

He appealed to the nation to always ensure they knew where their relatives were which would help them know if they went missing or died.

Dr Madigele said the ministry was trying to find ways of locating the next of kin in the event of death and tracing new mothers who ran away from the hospital leaving babies behind.

The hospital’s chief communications and public relations officer, Mr Donnell Kutlapye said in the over one year that they were in the mortuary, the bodies had to be taken care of on a daily basis but with time their state deteriorated as the freezers proved ineffective.

He said that all the deceased were unknown except for one Ms Omphile Mokena who had identified  herself before she passed on. ENDS