Lithuania’s three largest cities have buried 95 lonely or unidentified people during the first three quarters of this year.
Vilnius recorded 50 such burials, Klaipėda 25, and Kaunas 20.
Most of those who died were people living alone, without family or close relatives to take responsibility for their burial. In such cases, the state covers the funeral costs – as it does for unidentified individuals.
In Klaipėda, one unidentified person was laid to rest; in Vilnius, there were two. The capital also interred an urn containing the remains of human embryos or foetuses up to 22 weeks old.
Each urn contains several dozen embryos whose relatives did not wish to collect them following miscarriages, medical complications or abortions, said the Pathology Centre, which handed the embryos over to the Vilnius Funeral Services Centre.
A single burial of a lonely person costs Kaunas municipality around €700, Vilnius about €410, and Klaipėda €278. The work is carried out by private companies contracted through municipal tenders.
Those whose families decline to arrange the burial themselves are also laid to rest at the state's expense.
“It sometimes happens that a relative declines to arrange a funeral because of family conflicts or estrangement,” Aloyzas Pakalniškis, head of Kaunas City Maintenance Department, told BNS.
In Kaunas and Klaipėda, the bodies of lonely people are buried in coffins, while in Vilnius they are cremated.
According to Vilma Budėnienė, spokesperson for the Vilnius Funeral Services Centre, cremation is preferred because burial space in cemeteries is limited and urns can be reinterred more easily if relatives later come forward.
“Every few years, a family or relative appears wanting to rebury their family member themselves,” she said.
Unidentified individuals in Vilnius, as in other major cities, are buried in coffins to allow for possible future identification through DNA testing. At the gravesite, a traditional burial mound is formed and a cross is erected bearing a plaque reading Unknown Man or Unknown Woman, along with an approximate age, the date of discovery and burial, and the death certificate number.
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