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InterNations
China

In Wuhan, Ashes 'Mixed Together' Impossible To Identify

In the Chinese city where coronavirus first appeared,  the death toll may be much higher than official numbers. Ugly truths are now appearing as survivors wait in line to pick up remains of loved ones.

Chinese Vice Premier Sun Chunlan visits Wuhan this week.
Chinese Vice Premier Sun Chunlan visits Wuhan this week.

It's been one week since residents in Wuhan, the Chinese city where Covid-19 originated, have been allowed to collect the ashes of their family members who died during the epidemic. The long lines outside each of Wuhan's eight crematoria suggest the official coronavirus death count of 2,531 may be just a fraction of the true toll. But reports say despair is spreading among the relatives of the victims for another reason: the ashes may not be identifiable.

Tang Dynasty Television reported that social media posts by a local resident named Qin Peng, who said one of the crematorium confirmed to him that the ashes of all the dead were "mixed together, and just divided into equal amounts in the funeral urns in accordance with the total death toll."

"This is definitely 100% possible," another anonymous Wuhan citizen told the network. "During the peak time of the pandemic, the crematoria were burning several corpses at one time in each incinerator. No family member was allowed to be present. Who knows what they were doing."


For the coming weeks, Worldcrunch will be delivering daily updates on the coronavirus pandemic from the best, most trusted international news sources — regardless of language or geography. To receive the daily Coronavirus global brief in your inbox, sign up here.

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Society

For Seniors, Friendship May Be More Important Than Family

Even if the aging and elderly tend to wind up confined to family circles, Argentine academics Laura Belli and Danila Suárez explore the often untapped benefits of friendship in our later years.

Photograph of two elderly women and an elderly man walking arm in arm. Behind the, there are adverts for famous football players.

Two elderly women and a man walk arm in arm

Philippe Leone/Unsplash
Laura F. Belli and Danila Suárez Tomé

Updated Dec. 10, 2023 at 10:10 p.m.

BUENOS AIRES — What kind of friendship do people most talk about? Most often it is childhood or teenage friendships, while friendships between men and women are repeatedly analyzed. What about friendships among the elderly? How are they affected when friends disappear, at a stage when grieving is already more frequent?

Argentines Laura Belli and Danila Suárez Tomé, two friends with PhDs in philosophy, explore the challenges and benefits of friendship in their book Filosofía de la amistad (Friendship Philosophy).

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They consider how friendships can emerge later in life, in profoundly altered circumstances from those of our youth, with people living through events like retirement, widowhood, reduced autonomy or to a greater or lesser degree, personal deterioration. All these can affect older people's ability to form and keep friendships, even if changes happen at any stage in life.

Filosofía de la amistadexplores the place of friendships amid daunting changes. These are not just the result of ageing itself but also of how one is perceived, nor will they affect everyone exactly the same way. Aging has firstly become a far more diverse experience, with increasing lifespans and better healthcare everywhere, and despite an inevitable restriction in life opportunities, a good many seniors enjoy far greater freedom and life choices than before.

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