A family from Gicegeri Village in Embu, is appealing for financial assistance to help them bury their kin whose body is detained at Kenyatta University Hospital mortuary over a Sh335,000 bill.
Forty-nine-year-old Cecilia Marigu died of cancer on February 3 after spending a month at Kenyatta University Teaching, Referral and Research Hospital (KUTRRH), where she incurred a bill of Sh635,000.
Marigu started ailing in 2022 after suffering a swollen leg and has been in and out of various hospitals in Embu until late last year when she was diagnosed with cancer and referred to KUTRRH.
The family after holding several fundraisers, was able to raise Sh300,000 and has been unable to clear the balance to facilitate the release of the body for burial owing to financial hardships.
The bill continues to accumulate with every passing day the body stays at the morgue at the rate of Sh1,000 per day, prompting the family to plead for assistance.
“We have reached a dead end and we are now appealing to well-wishers to come to assist us offset the bill to enable us to bury my daughter,” said her 84-year-old mother Agatha Murangi.
The deceased’s sister Felista Muthoni said she sold her piece of land and a stall she owned in Embu Town to fund her treatment and has no other means to raise more money to offset the bill.
She said she is the one now left taking care of her elderly mother and two children left behind by the deceased as her other siblings are financially unstable.
“The issues of our sister’s body are giving us sleepless nights as a family having not been able to bury her so that we can also have closure over the matter,” she said.
Muthoni said no mourners come to their home anymore as they got tired of attending the rites with no indication of burial.
“People also stopped contributing towards the burial and we have been left on our own,” Muthoni lamented, as she reached out to people of goodwill to come to their rescue.
By Samuel Waititu
