Note: If you have questions about volunteering, please send an email to nfda@nfda.org.
For Immediate Release: April 5, 2020
Brookfield, Wis. – The National Funeral Directors Association (NFDA) is asking for volunteers who can travel to COVID-19 “hot spots” experiencing high death rates in order to lend on-the-ground assistance.
Given the likelihood that the COVID-19 pandemic will get worse before it gets better, NFDA is asking for members and other funeral service professionals who can assist in areas where infections and deaths are rapidly climbing. NFDA plans to maintain a list of volunteers who can mobilize quickly should it receive federal, state and/or local requests for assistance.
Funeral service professionals willing to volunteer can click here to fill out a form (https://www.nfda.org/covid-19/help-needed). The form asks potential volunteers to be as specific as possible with the kind of assistance and expertise they can offer. (Funeral service professionals who have already volunteered on the NFDA website do not need to provide their information again.)
NFDA anticipates providing volunteers deployment information sometime within the next few weeks, if not sooner. Specific information on locations, licensure reciprocity, expense reimbursement and travel will be provided prior to volunteer deployment.
“NFDA wants to thank all funeral professionals for being on the front lines during this pandemic,” says Christine Pepper, CAE, chief executive officer. “Please know that NFDA stands ready to support funeral directors everywhere – NFDA member or not – so funeral service professionals can carry out their mission. In the words of statesman William Ewart Gladstone, ‘Show me the manner in which a nation or a community cares for its dead. I will measure exactly the sympathies of its people, their respect for the laws of the land, and their loyalty to high ideals.’”
NFDA is the world’s leading and largest funeral service association, serving more than 20,000 individual members who represent nearly 11,000 funeral homes in the United States and 49 countries around the world. NFDA is the trusted leader, beacon for ethics and the strongest advocate for the profession. NFDA is the association of choice because it offers funeral professionals comprehensive educational resources, tools to manage successful businesses, guidance to become pillars in their communities and the expertise to foster future generations of funeral professionals. NFDA is headquartered in Brookfield, Wis., and has an office in Washington, D.C. For more information, visit www.nfda.org.
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Contact: Jessica Koth, 262-814-1536, jkoth@nfda.org