The Kenya Medical Research Institute (KEMRI) launched a Ksh.10.3 million mobile mortuary to enhance its research efforts on tackling Kenya's child mortality rates.

KEMRI Acting Director General Elijah Songok emphasized that the mobile mortuary has been a valuable asset in the government agency's research due to the high number of community fatalities among children under the age of five.

PHOTO | COURTESY KEMRI Acting Director General Elijah Songok

The truck is equipped with all of the gear needed to conduct an autopsy and has already performed over 1,000 post-mortem examinations, turning the country's efforts to eliminate infant mortality.

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"We have to take samples immediately because if we delay and say we take the samples after 24 hours then the body of the child would have already decomposed and we will not be able to get the cause of death," Dr. Richard Omore, the study's principal investigator, said.

PHOTO | COURTESY KEMRI Acting Director General Elijah Songok

He further stated that after collecting the samples, they are submitted to the laboratory for analysis, and the family is notified of the cause of death within 30 days.

According to the autopsies completed so far, malnutrition was the leading cause of child mortality, with other infectious illnesses such as malaria and HIV accounting for 10% of newborn mortality rates.

PHOTO | COURTESY  Mobile Mortuary 
The study's findings will subsequently be shared with funding partners to produce worldwide policy guidelines for reducing child mortality.

"A similar study is being conducted in Asia, Bangladesh, Latin America and some African countries so that shows how critical this facility is," Songkok said.