People 75-up in jail, prison facing delay for vaccine

Though Connecticut residents 75 or older can currently sign up to receive a COVID-19 vaccine, the state has created one notable and counterintuitive exception: people in jails, prisons and other staterun congregate settings.

Residents of congregate settings are included in Connecticut’s Phase 1B vaccination group but at a lower priority level than individuals 75 and older, whose vaccinations began this week. State officials say that individuals 75 and older who live in congregate settings will be vaccinated with others in their facilities, as opposed to with others in their age group.

The means people 75 and older in Department of Correction, Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services and Department of Developmental Services facilities must wait weeks or months longer for vaccination than others their age, despite living in settings with high potential for COVID-19 spread.

Claudine Fox, campaign manager for the ACLU of Connecticut, said Friday that the state was effectively discriminating against these residents.

“People who are 75-plus in prisons and jails are at extremely high risk of contracting COVID-19,” Fox said. “If we’re going to do this baseline decision for everyone 75-plus, it should include people who are living in these settings.”

Asked about this issue Monday, Gov. Ned Lamont said inmates and other people 75 and older in state facilities would have to wait.

“Those are congregate settings where it’s a lot more efficient to vaccinate everyone in that group or in that correctional facility when their time comes,” Lamont said.

Josh Geballe, the state’s chief operating officer, said the issue was one of logistics.

“It’s much more operationally efficient, as you can imagine, not to go into a

correctional facility to do 5% or 10% of the population and then come back a couple weeks later to do the rest,” Geballe said. “We’re going to do it all in one go.”

But advocates say people in congregate settings, and particularly those age 75 and older, shouldn’t have to wait. DOC has reported more than 3,000 COVID19 cases in its facilities, which currently house about 9,000 people, along with 15 coronavirus-linked deaths among inmates. Four of those deaths have occurred since the start of the current year.

It’s currently unclear when people in congregate settings will be eligible for vaccination. For now, the state has prioritized people 75 and older and has not announced which group will come next among others in Phase 1B (which also includes residents of congregate settings, people 65-74, frontline essential workers and adults with co-morbid conditions).

Lamont has urged patience, saying the full Phase 1B could take months to complete.

Vaccinating people in state custody would not necessarily require a largescale effort. As of January 1, DOC reported only 456 inmates 60 and older, meaning there are likely far fewer 75 or older.

“It seems particularly baffling and cruel given that it would only a small amount of people in prisons and jails who would receive the vaccine if we’re going by the baseline of needing to be 75-plus,” Fox said. “It doesn’t make sense.”

DMHAS, as of 2019, was treating more than 7,000 patients age 65 and older, a total that includes those receiving either inpatient or outpatient services.

Representatives for DOC and DDS did not respond to requests for comment.

Throughout the pandemic, activists at the ACLU of Connecticut and elsewhere have asked Lamont and state prison officials to better protect people in state custody, including through largescale releases. Lamont has largely resisted those calls, though the state incarcerated population has dropped significantly over the past year in part due to fewer people being sentenced.