Bolivia Coronavirus Update: 'Goodbye Brigades' Collect Corpses Of COVID-19 Victims Around The Country

A team of volunteers embark on a mission to collect the bodies of people who have died from the coronavirus outbreak in Bolivia.

According to a report, "Goodbye Brigades," a lesser-known group of volunteers that just recently formed in Bolivia, have decided to go off the beaten track and help the overwhelmed municipalities of the country.

The bedrock of the brigade was founded by beneficiaries of a charity that advocated for the youth of Bolivia. In the said program, the said beneficiaries were sent abroad to study in American or European universities and have now risen as ivy-league CEOs and senior executives of various firms.

Reportedly, the brigade has designed makeshift coffins from white cardboards and has been donating them to families who are too poor to pay for burials.

With a vast majority of Bolivians being Roman Catholics, the said coffins were accompanied with a cross stuck just on top of it.

The said group, also called "Avei" which means goodbye in their local dialect, are composed of members coming from different parts of the Bolivia.

One member, Luis Fernando Ortiz who is a Harvard alumnus, has decided to leave his job as a manager at Bolivia's biggest freight forwarding agent to answer the calls of the brigade.

Instead of waiting for the outbreak to pass, these members have been gathering the said corpses of ill-fated coronavirus victims and have been coordinating corpse collections to their relatives and the police.

Displaced corpses are also being reported to families who were unaware of their sad fate. After accounting for the said bodies and securing them in the makeshift coffins, they are then transported to the nearest cemetery.

Burial sites in Bolivia have been busy as several bulldozers try to keep up with the demand for new graves.

In Santa Cruz, a mass grave has occupied a once-flourishing strech of land filled with palm trees. Bodies after bodies, the Goodbye Brigades unloads the corpses to their final resting place.

To date, Bolivia has 16, 165 coronavirus cases and 533 reported deaths. But, this figure does not take into account the fact that the country has one of the lowest coronavirus-testing levels.