The Government has announced that it will be hiring an Indian pathologist next month to help to ease the backlog of post-mortems of people killed in incidents being investigated by the police.

That appointment will make four, the number of pathologists in the system, one less than the five existing posts.

The permanent secretary in the national security ministry, Major Richard Reese, said it had been a challenge for the Government to identify additional pathologists but that the administration remained committed to finding more than the five now provided.

"We are endeavouring to recruit additional pathologists," he said.

contracts extended

At the same time, Reese has confirmed that the contracts for Government pathologist, Dr Ere Seshiah, and one of his colleagues, have been extended by four months.

The contracts will now expire in July, but there are no indications as to whether they will be renewed. Reese says the contract extension will allow for the pathologists to complete another 500 outstanding post-mortem reports.

Reese said a special task force had also been formed to help to clear those reports.

In the meantime, two other pathologists have sessional basis to work on clearing the backlog.

The major also said some gains had been made in the past few months.

According to Reese, since March, the body count on storage at the Spanish Town Morgue had been reduced from 58 to 30, while the body count at the Madden's Funeral Home is now 67.

Reese has also disclosed that in addition to the Kingston Public Hospital and Spanish Town Hospital, the Government was now undertaking post-mortems at Madden's in an effort to ease the backlog.

The announcements comes months after human rights lobby group, Jamaicans For Justice (JFJ), intensified calls for urgent measures to clear the backlog in cases for post-mortem.

The JFJ said the matter was further compounded by what the group calls the "dead wait" at the Spanish Town Coroner's Court, which hears the circumstances leading to sudden deaths.

The report said, to make matters worse, there was an unavailability of jurors, an inadequate staff-to-caseload ratio, and low priority on Coroner's Court matters.

damion.mitchell@gleanerjm.com