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Release Many Behind Bars to Slow Virus’ Spread

  • Post Author
    By Henry Wolff
  • Post Date
    Thu Mar 26 2020

On Saturday, the first federal inmate tested positive for coronavirus in a Brooklyn, New York, facility. Prison staff in Pennsylvania, Michigan, New York and Washington state have tested positive for the virus, forcing inmate quarantines. The media has dramatized the risk to those caught on a cruise ship or in a nursing home where the virus begins to spread. But surely those most at risk are the 2.2 million Americans locked up on any one day in prisons and jails across the country.

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This peril is immediate and pressing. There are 2.2 million Americans locked up at any one time, but over 11 million go through prison or jail gates in any one year.

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The Center for Disease Control and Prevention has called on Americans to practice “social distancing,” staying six feet away from one another, even as more and more states issue stay at home orders. But prisoners literally are locked down. In overcrowded prisons and jails, they cannot practice social distancing, and they cannot stay at home. In jails and prisons, the incarcerated share bathrooms, laundry and eating areas. In many, the toilet tank doubles as the sink for hand washing. Those bunked in the same cell — as many as four — share toilets and sinks. Circulation is almost always poor

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Of the quarter of a million locked up in 122 different federal facilities, over 100,000 are over 60. Disproportionately poor and people of color, over 40 percent suffer from chronic health conditions.

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We should act now to ensure that incarceration does not turn into a death sentence for them.