The county government of Nairobi has given the public seven days to identify 108 unclaimed bodies, failure to which they will be disposed of.
The number of unclaimed bodies lying at the City Mortuary is 89 and 19 Mbagathi Hospital.
The county has appealed the public to identify the bodies before they dispose of them as required by the law.
"The following are 89 unclaimed bodies lying at the City Mortuary and 19 at the Mbagathi Hospital Funeral Home from the date of admission awaiting collection. Pursuant to Public Health Act Cap 242 .Members of the public are asked to identify and collect the named bodies within 7 days , failure to which the County Government of Nairobi will seek authority for disposal ," the notice says.
At the City Mortuary, out of the 89 bodies, 69 are unknown. The identified ones have been classified by gender: 19 male bodies, three female bodies and two fetuses.
At Mbagathi Hospital, the number of unclaimed bodies are 19: four females and and 15 males.
Among the 19 bodies, only three are unknown. The morgue has a storage capacity of 120 bodies.
The Public Health Act stipulates that a body should be removed from a mortuary within two weeks or be disposed of.
If the bodies are not identified, the county seeks court permission to get rid of them.
In November last year, the county disposed of 97 unclaimed bodies at the Mbagathi Hospital after obtaining a court order .
The county had raised concerns over the high number of bodies lying in the hospital's morgue since 2017.
The order was issued on October 16, 2019 by chief magistrate R. Oganyo of the city court.
