Funeral directors on Spain’s Costa del Sol ordered not to cremate corpses with pacemakers

Costa del Sol funeral directors must bury corpses if they have pacemakers

FUNERAL directors today have informed the Euro Weekly News that they have been instructed that they cannot cremate corpses who are fitted with a pacemaker and that it will be an offence to open up the corpse and remove it before burial no matter what the cause of death is.

The reason being is that pacemakers affect the incinerator and in normal circumstances corpses are allowed to be opened up for the pacemaker to be removed, but with the current crisis in place and so many deaths, the government don’t wish bodies to be opened up for the removal of the mechanical device in fear of infection from the coronavirus.

With burials being far more expensive for relatives than cremations this will cause concern for partners of those with a fitted pacemaker.

Nigel Williamson from Fuengirola who is fitted with a pacemaker responded to the new order by telling us: “Yes I heard that this morning, it’s a concern, I have called my life insurance company and upgraded, I wouldn’t like the thought of my wife having the extra expense, we have a policy with the wonderful company of a pre plan funeral which was cremation so I will be contacting them today to ask advice.”

It’s currently unclear if post-mortems are also to be banned as the notice to all funeral directors has just been received.