1. Numbers allowed to attend funerals caused terrible grief and sorrow for the
   bereaved.
   
   The main focus would appear to have been on hand shaking, hugging and
   touching the deceased. At a very early stage it was determined that Covid 19 did
   not survive on surfaces after 72 hours. In most cases it was 72 hours before the
   deceased was released to funeral directors. So why then were so many grieving
   people denied the opportunity to see their loved one, one last time, let alone
   touch them?
   
   It also became a practise of many funeral directors, to put the deceased in two
   body bags, and carry out direct burial.
   This guidance was published by the IAFD without any rationale or scientific
   backup. The IAFD claimed to represent 80% of funeral directors on the Island of
   Ireland. This was inaccurate information. Social distancing was in operation
   throughout the communities around the country, and systems operated in
   Supermarkets could have been applied to funerals, which would have allowed
   for many more people to attend funerals. Masses and services took place in
   large churches which had capacity for far more than were allowed to attend
   funerals. Some cemeteries even limited numbers of those in attendance.
   Members of single households could have stayed together in ‘bubbles’ at
   funerals, socially distanced from other such ‘bubbles’. It made no sense for
   people to have to socially distance in a church, having travelled in the same car
   from the same household.

2) There was no clear decision on whether or not embalming was allowed.
While the Professional Embalmers’ Association made numerous attempts to
communicate with NPHET, for the most part these e_orts were ignored. I and the
members of the Professional Embalmers’ Association were keeping up-to-date
with WHO guidance, combined with guidance from the HPSC. Neither
organisation gave any clear direction indicating that embalming was not
permitted. Universal precautions were recommended, and having had training in
these, I gave training seminars to members of the Professional Embalmers’
Association, and extended an invitation to funeral directors who were not in the
organisation.

Why was the Irish Association of Funeral Directors not held accountable for their
guidance, and asked for scientific reasons for their guidance to their members?
Their members’ actions lead to unnecessary additional pain to the bereaved.
I continued to embalm, using universal precautions, throughout the pandemic,
and yet some others accused me of being reckless, and not obeying rules ( the
‘guidance’ of the IAFD)

‘Health officials say immediate burial of those who die from Covid-19 and postponing
funerals ‘not necessary’

Official guidance to funeral directors will be provided tomorrow.
1.40pm, 10 Mar 2020’ The Journal.
https://www.thejournal.ie/irish-funeral-directors-coronavirus-covid-19-
5039654-Mar2020/

Why were the IAFD not stopped from misleading the public, when medical and
scientific professionals has stated that their recommendations were not
necessary.

At one point, I spoke with a funeral director from another part of the country, who
told me that he had told a family that they couldn’t go near the grave for five
years, because of a danger of getting Covid 19 if the grave was opened or
touched. These bizarre assumptions of some, were a result of the IAFD guidance, and
things like this should never have happened had the government put a stop to
the misinformed guidance.

.
3) Why was one group of professionals invited to attend meetings with the HSE
and other professionals were excluded.

The IAFD claimed to be meeting up to four times weekly throughout the crises with HSE, while other professionals in the sector were excluded despite attempts to communicate directly with
members of NPHET and the HSE. It wasn’t clear who was attending these
meetings or if Colm Kieran mislead the public on Claire Byrne Live on Monday
25th May 2020 in making this claim, as a member of the organisation.

4) I was not consulted as expert in the field by NPHET. I studied mortuary science
in Chicago in the 1980s when AIDS had become a huge health problem, and
health professionals had learned how to take precautions to treat patients safely,
while protecting the dignity of the patients. This philosophy had also extended to
the death care sector at the time.

5) Sligo Co. Council considered my mortuary facilities to have more capacity
than the mortuary facilities in Sligo University Hospital, in the event of cold
storage for large numbers of deceased persons being required. Sligo County
Council had an arrangement in place with me in the event of such disastrous
circumstances arising.

6) As a supplier of PPE for embalmers and funeral directors (D.J.MacNeice &
Co.), our supplies were acquired by the HSE under compulsion, leaving us
with no PPE for our regular customers in the funeral sector. This exposed the
sector to a shortage of PPE, a sector that had to manage the funerals of
deceased who had contracted Covid 19. It took the HSE almost a year to pay for
this equipment.

7) I have spent many hours talking to bereaved people who struggle to get over
the pain of not seeing their loved one. I was not looking after the funerals of
their loved ones, as they were from di_erent parts of the country. It really upsets
me to think that so much of this practise was unnecessary. It could have been
avoided had the government put a stop to one organisation publishing guidance
with measures that were unnecessary. This guidance was published through the
national media, and on the IAFD website.

8) I actually carried out funerals of deceased persons whose families knew
that their loved one died of e.g. cancer, but then Covid 19 was put as the
cause of death on the death certificate and no mention of the terminal illness
of the deceased. This upset families, who saw Covid 19 as a stigma, especially
when they had gone overboard to protect their vulnerable relative. Some of these
deceased persons only contracted Covid 19 when they had no choice but to go
to a hospital setting, and sadly were terminally ill. It was having Covid 19 on their
death certificate that was most disturbing for these families, as it implied that
one of them could have been ‘guilty’ of carrying Covid 19 into the house.