The son of an inmate holds a sign at a rally to bring awareness to the conditions inside the Marion Correctional Institution in Marion, Ohio on May 2, 2020. - A massive wave of coronavirus infections is blasting through the world's largest prison population in the United States even as officials begin opening up their economies, saying the disease has plateaued.
The Times measured the pandemic’s excruciating impact on prisoners using records requests and interviews with people from all corners of the system and spoke with incarcerated people and their families, prison wardens, jailers, prosecutors, defense attorneys and civil rights groups. These deaths and many of the more than 525,000 infections so far among the incarcerated could have been prevented, public health and criminal justice experts say.
By then, public health officials were warning wardens that prisons needed to take precautionary measures against the virus, especially for older prisoners. Health officials said that without basic steps, including social distancing, better sanitation and less crowding, correctional institutions had the potential to become incubators for the virus.
States have so many inmates that gyms have been converted into housing areas, recreational yards have been shrunk or eliminated to accommodate more beds, and prisons have shifted from cells to dormitory-style housing, with people sleeping in double- or triple-tiered bunks that fill nearly every bit of floor space.
Early in the pandemic, one of the hardest-hit places was the Oakdale federal prison, with about 1,900 people in rural south Louisiana. An outbreak there infected 689 inmates and guards, and nine inmates died. Eight days later, inmates started complaining of symptoms. The prison did not screen them consistently for the virus, and staff members did not wear masks or other protective gear while transporting and guarding sick inmates at hospitals.
Only a handful of states have released more than a few thousand people early, despite calls from a variety of groups and some prosecutors to reduce prison populations amid the pandemic.
Law Law Latest News, Law Law Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Source: voguemagazine - 🏆 715. / 51 Read more »