PKG: morgues overflowing with COVID-19

As possible.

Several counties posted record coronavirus numbers today...including madison...which reported its highest single day count...144 new cases...and sadly more cases are often followed by more deaths.

We have seen troubling images during this pandemic of refrigerated trucks outside hospitals acting as makeshift morgues...which right now are overflowing in el paso, texas.

Abc 36's monica harkins talked to the madison county coroner about whether that could happen here.

### "click of door" many don't want to think about it...but for some...getting covid-19 could mean the end of your life.

"corneilson: people are really really tired of this.

But we can't let our guard down.

" for madison county coroner jimmy cornelison death is a part of another day's work...but now, between seeing overdoses and coronavirus he's seeing a lot more of it.

"cornelison: we're still climbing.

And if you remember before when we kind of started back down.

There was a long period of time in there before we started back then and we're nowhere close to doing that."

Madison county is one of about 100 kentucky counties right now in the red zone...where more than 25 people out of every 100,000 have the virus.

Madison coun0.

Cornelison says his morgue has space right now...but if several people die all in just a couple days...that could change.

Nat he says there is a way...though...you can help avoid the grim imagery of overflowing morgues...beyond protecting yourself from the virus.

It's grim...but he says you need to plan ahead even if you're young and healthy.

" monica: is it fair to ask people to have a plan in place?

Jimmy: 'oh, i preach that, i preach that, you can go to the funeral home and start making payments on it."

Payments you hopefully won't need to cash in on anytime soon... in madison county, monica harkins, abc 36