Government to Expand Crematoriums in Preparation for COVID-19 Resurgence

Promotion of Opening and Repair of 238 Cremators Within the Year... Additional Securing of Burial Space

The Seoul Metropolitan Crematorium in Goyang-si, Gyeonggi Province, on March 16. / Photo by Mun Ho-nam munonam@

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Young-won] The government announced on the 31st that it will proactively reorganize cremation facilities to prepare for the influx of overseas COVID-19 variants and a resurgence of the pandemic.

The government plans to first establish a manpower pool connected with retirees from cremation facilities, funeral directors, and funeral director department trainees who can be deployed to operate cremators. These personnel can be quickly assigned to cremation facilities in emergencies.

Additionally, the government will proceed with the repair and maintenance of 238 cremators at 43 cremation facilities within the year, and will provide national funding to facilities capable of expanding cremators to support such expansions.

The government also plans to secure additional storage space by installing refrigerated storage units and indoor/outdoor low-temperature storage rooms at 60 cremation facilities. Indoor low-temperature storage rooms can be converted into mortuary rooms in case of a sudden increase in deaths due to disasters by insulating existing idle spaces such as warehouses or conference rooms or installing refrigeration compressors.

Earlier, in March of this year when Omicron was peaking, crematories and mortuary rooms, mainly in the metropolitan area, reached saturation. The cremation rate on the third day, which was 77.9% in February, dropped to a low of 20% on March 19.

Since then, as COVID-19 deaths decreased and the government operated a concentrated cremation facility operation period, the cremation rate on the third day recovered to a normal level of 86.4% as of the 29th of this month.

Lee Ki-il, the first chief coordinator of the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters, said, "Expanding cremation facilities is an urgent task not only to respond to a sudden increase in deaths due to national disasters but also to the rise in deaths caused by aging," and urged, "Local governments without cremation facilities should actively strive to provide sufficient cremation facilities for their residents."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.