Hepatitis C has ripped through prisons and jails, despite more effective treatments for the disease. It is a comorbidity to COVID-19, and the pandemic threatens to cut already weak state funding for prisons to treat those with the disease.
“They are treating it like any epidemic in prison—that is to isolate, treat and then release back to the population.”
“The doctors said they were going to come and do screenings every day, but for the past two days, they’ve just come into the dorm and stood by the front door and yelled, ‘Does anybody have any symptoms?’”
“Still no hand sanitizer, no bleach.”
New research shows that jails contribute to infectious disease deaths in the greater community.