Advancing Public Health Interventions to Address the Harms of the Carceral System

Copyright

2020

Since January 2020, as many as 7 million cases and over 200,000 U.S. deaths have been attributed to the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). Yet, arguably no group of residents has been more affected than people incarcerated in jails, prisons, and detention centers. These uniquely susceptible environments place incarcerated individuals at increased risk of not only contracting COVID-19, but developing severe infections that require hospitalization or result in death, given their older age and disproportionately high burden of underlying conditions.