Australia morgue blasted for refusing 'too fat' bodies

An Australian funeral director had to store the body of a 200kg man in her car overnight after a morgue refused it for being too big, according to news reports on Thursday.

The director, Joanne Cummings, said she had to drive for two hours back home with the corpse in her hearse, with the air conditioner going full blast to keep it cool.

“I actually had to turn around and drive two hours home to Roebourne [in western Australia] and keep him in my car overnight,” she told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

“I had to have the air-con up full and look after him that way, check on him every half hour, and the following morning we hired a sea container with a chiller unit in it.”

Cummings, the co-owner of Pilbara Funeral Services in northwest Australia, said it was not the first time the Hedland Health Campus hospital had rejected large bodies.

She said a staff member described a 250kg dead man last year as “too fat, he can’t go in the fridge”.