The Chief Executive Officer of the Mortuaries and Funeral Facilities Agency, Dr. Yaw Twerefuor, has revealed plans to prohibit the use of ambulances for transporting corpses in Ghana.

Currently, it is a common sight to witness ambulances carrying deceased individuals from mortuaries for burial, and in some cases, taxis or minibuses are employed for this purpose.

Dr. Twerefuor has emphasized that this practice is incorrect, as ambulances are intended for transporting living individuals in need of medical assistance.

He urged drivers to cease this practice and stressed that a new policy will soon be introduced to license hearse vehicles for corpse transportation.

“Very soon we’ll come out with a policy that will ensure that not any vehicle will be allowed to convey a corpse, we’ll license hearse for such operations. Let me stress this issue: those vehicles that have the inscription “Ambulance” that conveys corpses will be outlawed soon. Ambulances are supposed to carry a living person battling to survive, once the person dies, an ambulance should not be used to carry him or her, it must be a hearse," he added.

Dr. Twerefuor also noted the legal distinctions between ambulance and hearse operations and warned against the inappropriate use of strobe lights and sirens on hearses.

Under the new policy, all hearses in Ghana will be required to obtain licenses to govern their operations, preventing the use of unlicensed hearses for corpse transportation.

He added that “if its a hearse and you have strobe lights fixed on the vehicle with blurring sirens, you’ll also have questions to answer”.

“We’ll be coming out with a policy where all the hearse in Ghana will be licensed to govern their operations such that one cannot give a corpse to an unlicensed hearse” Mr. Twerefuor said.