Versión Español
EspañolOn Monday, Ricardo Guedez, member and former president of the National Chamber of Funeral Companies, said that the production of coffins has plummeted by half in the last few months.
Due to the shortage of metal, varnish, and satin sheets, funeral companies in Venezuela are scrambling to get a hold of coffins. This has made the process of burying the dead much more complicated in a country that has one of the highest homicide rates in the world. Last year in Venezuela, at least 11,000 violent deaths were officially reported.
Venezuelans have had to resort to lending caskets to one another, or even traveling to Colombia to find them. Some funeral companies are encouraging clients to cremate the bodies, so the coffin can be used just during the funeral, and then “recycled.”
The socialist President Nicolás Maduro describes the shortage as the result of an “economic war” led by the opposition, who wants to oust him from office.
Source: Reuters.
