Premature Burial and How It May Be Prevented

by William Tebb; Edward Perry Vollum

2. There are no dead-houses, except at the hospitals, which are under the management of the superintendent.

3. The certificate of the medical attendant is sufficient for burial purposes. The complete cessation of respiration and the heart’s action are considered an absolute indication of death. When decomposition sets in, it usually appears within twenty-four hours after death, although in winter that process may be longer delayed.

MOSCOW.

Orthodox Russians keep their dead three days before burial. During that time the body lies with the face uncovered, and a deacon chants and prays over it twice a day. A medical certificate of death is imperative before burial.

BRUSSELS.

Burials are regulated by the Communal Council in accordance with law. The system is complicated, but thorough. The medical men connected with the Government Medical Service (“Doctors of the Civil Government”) have the sole control of the examinations of deaths, as well as births, accidents, sudden deaths, suicides; and attend to burials, autopsies, postponements of burials, etc., on their own motion. Interments usually take place within forty-eight hours of death, but they may be carried out sooner during epidemics for the public safety.

There are mortuaries in the city and suburbs, to which bodies may be taken at the request of surviving relatives, or by the order of the health authorities, according to private necessities or for the public safety. Except by the special authorisation of the officers of the civil government, bodies cannot remain in the mortuaries longer than forty-eight hours; and a burial cannot take place in less than twenty-four hours. Special care is taken to test the reality of death in still-born infants, and efforts are made to revive them, as well as all other cases of seeming death. In cases of women dying during advanced pregnancy, the infant must be roused by artificial respiration, in order to restore animation if possible. The process for obtaining a delay for burial is intricate and cumbersome, and to a foreigner unaccustomed to the language and the local usages the chances would be against securing such a permit before the time allowed for burial had transpired.

DENMARK.

Mortuaries are connected with all the churches, cemeteries, and some of the hospitals, and are growing in favour in the country places; but as yet they are unprovided with any appliances for the resuscitation of the apparently dead, or for the prevention of premature burials. No corpse, however, is allowed to be taken to a mortuary before it has been inspected, and a death-certificate issued by a qualified physician; but, when this is done, death is considered absolute. No corpse is allowed to remain in any church, chapel, or mortuary longer than seven days after supposed death, without special permission. Coffins that contain bodies which have died from infectious diseases must be so indicated, and cannot be opened in the mortuaries.