滝本 匠 
July 28, 2022 Ryukyu Shimpo
By Mariko Nakamura, Yuki Karimata, and Reiko Akamine
In the southern region of Okinawa’s main island, the waiting time for cremating victims of the COVID-19 pandemic has grown quite long. With the sudden increase of cases in Okinawa, the number of deceased has also increased, putting a strain on cremation facilities. At two publicly-managed cremation facilities, the wait time has grown to around once week. Facilities in the central region of the island are also reporting an increase in pace.
There is a time lag in reporting the numbers of those who have died from the coronavirus in Okinawa, so it is possible that the number of deaths could exceed what has been reported so far.
At the Inanse Funeral Hall and Minami Funeral Hall, which are both run by the “Southern Regional Association of Cities, Towns, and Villages,” a group comprising 15 municipalities in southern Okinawa and the outlying islands, the cremation of victims of the coronavirus are separated from other general cremations, and are conducted after 3:00 p.m. each day. The Inanse Funeral Home has three time slots for these cremations, and the Minami Funeral Hall has two. As of July 27, Inanse has stopped taking reservations until August 2, and similarly Minami Funeral Hall is booked through the end of the month.
According to representatives of each of the funeral halls, the number of cremations due to the coronavirus has been increasing since the start of July. At Inanse, they had 19 cases in June, and as of July 27 the number of cases was already at 22. At Minami Funeral Home the cases increased from 8 in June to 19 so far in July. Inanse had a similar number of cremations in July last year, and they expect to exceed this number.
A representative from Inanse noted that while they prioritize remains from Naha and Urasoe, Okinawa’s central region does not have many public cremation facilities, so they have been taking remains from there as well, which is a factor in their tight situation.
The Minami Funeral Home is looking into increasing the slots for coronavirus victims from two to three.
Remains are kept at funeral homes until they are able to be cremated. Sogo Sosai (Naha) established a specialty morgue for this purpose last year. A representative said that this year, “We are getting fewer requests than the previous year,” confirming that they had surplus space. However, regular cremations are also seeing long waits, of up to 4-5 days in some cases. There are some that are unable to plan funeral services because they cannot schedule a cremation.
(English translation by T&CT and Sam Grieb)
