Some 460 expat bodies have been flown back home over the last three months, local media said, quoting a senior official at the Riyadh-based Forensic Medicine Department.

We used to fly out annually up to 1,800 bodies of adults or newborns, who died from natural causes or after suicide, Ali Bawazir, head of death affairs at the department, told local media.

He said the Health Ministry would bear the deportation expenses of expats who had worked with the ministry at the time of their death.

Several administrative procedures are required for flying bodies out of the Kingdom, including acquiring mummification certificates, burial permits, death certificates, air bookings, and the approval of the embassy of the home country to where these bodies will be deported.

The mummification team is assisted by a body cleaner, depending on the gender of the deceased, he said.