Thomas Breen Photo
Social distancing outside Howard K. Hill Funeral Home at Covid-19 victim Curtis Hunt’s viewing.
Five employees of a New Haven funeral home have moved into Yale dorm rooms to protect their families’ health amid the Covid-19 pandemic.
Meanwhile, the total number of confirmed Covid-19 cases in New Haven has risen to 696, with 15 fatalities, according to city Health Director Maritza Bond.
Those were some of the latest local developments Monday in the pandemic.
Thomas Breen File Photo
Yale Assistant Police Chief Anthony Campbell (pictured) suggested the university include funeral home workers as among the first-responders for whom 300 dorm rooms have been made available. The rooms are for people who do not test positive for the disease but may encounter it during their work, and would like to continue working without potentially exposing family members at home.
Five employees of McClam Funeral Home, which primarily serves the black community, have taken up Yale’s offer and moved into dorm rooms. The group includes Darrell McClam, who opened up the business in 2000 and still runs it.
So far none of his employees have displayed Covid-19 symptoms, McClam reported, though workers elsewhere at other funeral homes have. He noted that he and his staff handle the bodies of people who have died from Covid-19 and therefore may be exposed to the highly communicable disease in their work.
“We didn’t want to take that chance with the job that we do to affect our family,” McClam (pictured) said Monday. “I’m just protecting my family and my mom.”
Howard K. Hill said employees of his home are taking extensive precautions. Depending on the situation, his crew can make use of N95 masks, shoe covers, hair nets, goggles, even disaster suits for extreme situations, including when entering homes where people have contracted the virus.
Hill noted that much is still unknown about the disease, including what risks exist in handling corpses.
“When we’re moving remains, there’s always a puff of air that comes out of the mouth. We’re trained to deal with that. But also I’m assuming that it could transfer through blood,” Hill said. “We’re trained to deal with that. What we don’t know, when a person passes away, is the virus still alive? If so, how long is it alive for?”
Assistant Chief Campbell got the idea to include funeral home workers in the dorm-room plan from the Rev. Boise Kimber, through a clergy group with which he meets regularly. Kimber told the Independent funeral home workers had approached him with concerns about their safety.
Thank you to the funeral home workers and coroners who are dealing with grieving families and risking their lives on the back end of this pandemic. I keep hearing about food donated from restaurants being delivered to hospital workers and first responders, maybe somebody could give the final end of life care workers something to cheer up their day. In Italy they are having to bury bodies in mass graves due to the staggering volume of deaths. The coroners, funeral home workers, cemetery workers and grave diggers are performing a Herculean task at this crazy time, and deserve our appreciation.