Coffins in the parking lot: A Spanish funeral home copes

BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Death is part of his profession. But even Jordi Fernández, a mortician in Barcelona, Spain, wasn’t prepared for seeing the hundreds of bodies, victims of the coronavirus. To deal with the increase in dead the funeral home has turned an underground garage into a morgue. It is currently housing the bodies of over 500 victims of the pandemic as public cemeteries and crematoria struggle to keep up with the increase in demand. The virus has killed nearly 19,000 people in Spain according to health authorities, but they only count cases where victims have tested positive for COVID-19. Funeral homes know too well that the real number could be much higher.