Last Seen's 'Postmortem' podcast asks: How should we treat the dead?

Death of a loved one can bring with it a deep sense of loss. We miss that person's personality, their energy, and we honor that with our grief. But how do we as a society, respect their remains, the bodies they leave behind?

That question is at the center of the latest season of WBUR’s podcast Last Seen, which came out this month:  “Postmortem: The Stolen Bodies of Harvard.” 

The podcast follows a scandal at Harvard Medical School that made headlines last year when a manager at the medical school morgue was accused of selling body parts donated to the school for scientific study.

Today on The Common, Darryl C. Murphy speaks with host and reporter Ally Jarmanning about her experience diving into the apparently flourishing underground market for human remains and her quest to answer the question: How should we treat the dead?