The Nairobi Metropolitan Services has issued a 7-day notice to members of the public to collect 70 bodies lying at three morgues in the city.
In a public notice, NMS Health Secretary Dr. Ouma Oluga said 70 unclaimed bodies are lying at the three city morgues.
NMS says they will seek authority for disposal of the bodies, which are lying at City Mortuary, Mama Lucy, and Mbagathi Hospital Funeral Homes, once the notice period lapses.
“Pursuant to Public Health Ac Cap 242 (Subsidiary Legislation Public Health Mortuaries Rules, 1991), interested members of the public are asked to identify and collect the named bodies within seven days, failure to which the Nairobi Metropolitan Services will see authority for disposal,” read part of the notice.
Out of the 70, fifty-seven unclaimed bodies are lying at City Mortuary, 11 at Mama Lucy, and 2 at Mbagathi.
At City Mortuary, 44 bodies were unknown with 13 having been identified and their names published.
Thirty bodies had been at the morgue since last year November and the rest were cases from this year.
Twenty-one deaths were sudden, five drowned, eight from accidents, four classified as natural deaths, nine from murder and six died as a result of mob justice.
Two cases were from suicide, one from fire and one body was brought to the morgue decomposed.
The 11 bodies found at Mama Lucy Funeral Home were all male, with the youngest being 25 years old and the oldest being 48 years old.
The unclaimed bodies at Mbagathi were of a 40-year-old man and an 86-year-old woman.
Under CAP 242 of the Public Health Act an unclaimed body should be removed from a mortuary within 14 days period or else it is disposed off in a mass grave after public officers obtain a court order.
This comes after Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH) issued public notice to Kenyans to identify and collect 418 unclaimed bodies at the hospital within seven days.
The hospital warned that after the lapse of the deadline, it will be forced to invoke the public health act and seek authority to dispose the unclaimed bodies.
Kisumu County government disposed 61 bodies that had been lying in the county’s various mortuaries after obtaining court orders.