Crematoriums order bigger furnaces as waistlines grow By STEVE DOUGHTY
The spread of obesity is causing a problem for funeral directors and crematorium managers, it has been disclosed. Their clients are now often so large that their coffins will not fit into the furnaces, town hall chiefs said.
They complained that council tax payers are now having to cope with refurbishment of crematoria so they can cope with the increasing demand for over-sized coffins. No funeral has yet been halted by an embarrassing blockage after the curtains swing back, thanks to the vigilance of funeral companies and their checks on what will fit into crematoria. But the Local Government Assocation, the umbrella body for local councils, said some funerals were having to be switched to venues miles from the home of the family of the deceased in order to find a crematorium that could cope. Its spokesman Hazel Harding said: "The death of a loved one is always a difficult time and having to decamp half way across the country for the cremation just adds to the ordeal. "As long as the nation keeps piling on the pounds, pressure will continue to be placed on crematoria. This is just another demonstration of how the obesity problem is putting a real strain on public services."
A standard coffin measures between 16 and 20 inches across. However, coffins of up to 40 inches are now increasingly in demand to cope with bigger bodies. A high proportion of the 650 crematoria in the country are now ordering bigger furnances to deal with the numbers of bigger coffins.
Among them Lewisham in South London has ordered a 44 inch cremator from the United States, where the world's highest rates of obesity means the funeral trade is geared up to meet the problem. Bawsey in Norfolk has devoted part of a £1.2 million refurbishment to preparing for coffins of 39 inches, while in Blackburn a 42 inch cremator is to be installed.
The Lancashire town has been sending bodies to Manchester for cremation in recent months.
Miss Harding said: "As waistlines keep expanding we can expect more and more larger furnaces."
Tim Morris of the Institute of Cemetery and Crematoriam Management said: "We have received calls from funeral directors from all parts of the the country whose local crematorium is unable to cremate large coffins.
"The likelihood is that a large number of facilities will be upgraded to meet these requirements with some taking this opportunity to install a larger cremator."
Around 430,000 of the 600,000 people who die in Britain each year are cremated.
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