A recent video posted on social media shows how a truck is used as an improvised hearse due to the deteriorated condition of the fleet of vehicles intended for these services in Santiago de Cuba.
Local journalist Yosmany Mayeta denounced on Facebook the crisis of funeral services in the province and shared a video of a bus intended for mass passenger transportation that had to carry a coffin.
Santiago de Cuba currently only has two operational hearses to serve the entire deceased population, an unsustainable situation for a city of one million inhabitants that has been repeatedly denounced.
The conditions of these vehicles are terrible, forcing families to seek desperate alternatives for the transportation of their loved ones.
The report indicates that the use of rented trucks to transport coffins is now a sad norm in Santiago de Cuba.
The deterioration of the service has been evidenced in multiple incidents: last month, a coffin fell from a hearse on a busy avenue in Santiago, and on another occasion, it could be seen how a burial took place in the rain, with the coffin being carried on the shoulders of mourners due to the lack of appropriate vehicles.
In May 2023, José Borrero Sotomayor, provincial director of Communal Services, told the pro-government newspaper Sierra Maestra that "funeral services continue to be subsidized by the State. The regulated fees are charged as per Resolution: interprovincial transfers are priced at 4.00 pesos per kilometer, cremation at 340 pesos, exhumation at 156, and floral arrangements - wreaths and bouquets - according to the mourner's request," the official stated at the time.
However, this is something that, judging by the experiences mentioned, is not fulfilled.
According to the manager, the province of Santiago de Cuba had only ten hearses last year, which was insufficient for a province with over a million inhabitants, half of whom reside in the main municipality.
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