The tradition of families passing by open caskets to say silent farewells to the deceased at churches or at funeral parlours has been abandoned. The coffins are sealed directly at the hospital morgue near the tiny Italian town of Revello on the French border.
 
Everyone in Revello understands it is safer that way since so many of those who have died across Italy's pandmic-hit north first contracted the novel coronavirus. The tradition of families passing by open caskets to say silent farewells to the deceased at churches or at funeral parlours has been abandoned.