I must admit I’m in two minds as to whether this constitutes a ridiculous response or just a lazy one. It was posted by a former funeral director on the message board of an Australian TV company, in relation to a particular AIDS documentary that had been broadcast.

As you’ll see, the author describes how they dealt with the body of a man who had died from AIDS. It includes placing it into two vacuum-sealed body bags and then a lead coffin. The author also describes his social life for the following six weeks – the amount of time it took for two blood tests to come back clear.

The part of me that thinks this was just a lazy response feels that he could have spent far less time and energy finding out about AIDS and, if nothing else, the basic principles of Infection Control. This would have put his mind at ease and he would have seen just how unnecessary his extreme actions were.

On the other hand, the fact that he chose not to do this and, instead, behave in the most absurd way makes me think that this is a ridiculous response. If he sees himself as a professional then he has a professional responsibility to keep himself informed about the issues that are relevant to his profession. And he should be doing that not just for himself but also for his clients: I wonder, for example, how the carers of the deceased felt when his body was collected by two men dressed like space men then placed in a double, sealed coffin as if he was some sort of vampire.

And then I read what the funeral director did in his personal life for the following six weeks. Actually, there’s no doubt about it – this was an extremely ridiculous response. And here it is:

I was in the Funeral Business and we were all very unsure how to handle the deceased body. I and our foreman volunteered to collect the first remains that a Doctor had signed off that cause of death was AIDS.I believe the male caught the disease from a blood transfusion.

We dressed in all the protective gear we could fine including respirators. We placed the body into a vacuum sealed body bag. I think we used two. Then the body was placed into a lead coffin and sealed airtight closed. Then the remains were placed into a solid wooden coffin (not particle board as is used today)with the lid glued on and one way screws used.

The remains were then taken back to our morgue and placed into refrigeration which we set to it’s coldest setting. The vehicle was steam cleaned inside and out, all paper we had used was incinerated.

I lived above the funeral home and went upstairs running a bath with the hottest water I could stand, used two bottles of disinfectant and sat in it till the water cooled and I came out like a prune.

Being married, we agreed to sleep separately for six weeks until I could be blood test clear twice. We were so paranoid that we had no physical contact for this time using disposable eating utensils, washing only after I had disinfected all surfaces.

Toileting was similar. I wore disposable gloves at all times during this period. Being sociably responsible my colleague and myself did not venture into the public domain. Even fellow colleagues were very wary of us keeping their distance. Nobody knew very much about the terrible new disease and it was a very difficult time personally and for the industry as a whole