Nepal Plans 12 New Hospital Mortuaries to Strengthen Disaster Readiness

Nepal’s Ministry of Health and Food Hygiene is moving to build mortuaries in 12 federal hospitals and health science academies, a major step toward improving how the country handles disaster-related fatalities and unclaimed bodies.

Each new facility is expected to have space for at least 50 bodies, with the rollout covering several of the country’s most important public hospitals, including Koshi Hospital, Narayani Hospital, Gajendra Narayan Singh Hospital, and Bharatpur Hospital.

Why this matters

The plan comes as hospital morgues have increasingly shown their limits during major emergencies. In recent disaster responses, existing storage capacity in several regions was quickly overwhelmed, exposing gaps in Nepal’s body management infrastructure.

By adding dedicated mortuary space across key federal institutions, the government is aiming to improve preservation, identification, and coordination during floods, accidents, and other mass-casualty events.

What the project includes

The mortuaries will be placed in 12 federal hospitals and health science academies across the country. Officials say the design baseline is at least 50 bodies per facility, which should create a more stable national network for emergency response.

Hospitals named in the plan include Koshi Hospital, Narayani Hospital, Gajendra Narayan Singh Hospital, and Bharatpur Hospital, all of which serve large populations and often play central roles in regional crisis response.

A broader disaster-management upgrade

The move suggests the Health Ministry is treating mortuary capacity as part of essential disaster infrastructure, not just a hospital back-end function. In practice, better storage can help authorities give families more time for identification, reduce pressure on overburdened wards, and support forensic processes after large-scale incidents.

It also reflects a growing recognition that emergency planning has to include the difficult logistics that come after rescue efforts end.

Looking ahead

If implemented on schedule, the mortuary network could become one of Nepal’s most practical public-health upgrades in years. The success of the plan will depend on funding, construction speed, staffing, and how well the facilities are integrated into broader disaster-response systems.

For now, the announcement marks a clear signal that Nepal is trying to close a critical gap in its health infrastructure before the next major emergency arrives.