Hospital running out of space for bodies after rise in deaths

A trust warned it was running out of mortuary space and not meeting new standards, following national concerns about post-death care in the NHS.

Royal Cornwall Hospitals Trust raised the concerns in board papers for an extraordinary meeting last week.

The trust’s board risk register noted that an inability to provide adequate capacity could lead to the loss of its Human Tissue Authority licence, which would mean “all mortuary related activity… would have to cease”.

It also warned that periods of “increased activity” could lead to its mortuary services “not [having] capacity to store all the deceased… even when our contingency measures have been activated”.

The trust’s mortuary in Truro has space for 79 deceased patients, and the trust has had to activate contingency plans over the past 12 months due to “an increase in the number of deaths and an increase in the length of stay”, the board paper said.

This has included utilising private funeral home capacity, transferring bodies to West Cornwall Hospital in Penzance, and using four “temporary storage units”.

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Source: HSJ, 29 July 2026