Prisons fight virus outbreaks amid staff concerns
SACRAMENTO — With a new and more infectious coronavirus variant sweeping California, attorneys representing inmates say violations of health orders by prison staff risk a repeat of the outbreaks that killed dozens in the first year of the pandemic.
Gov. Gavin Newsom's administration is fighting a federal judge's order that all California prison workers must be vaccinated against the coronavirus or have a religious or medical exemption. The administration argues in part that frequent testing can help limit the virus's spread.
But large percentages of employees who are required to be tested twice weekly aren't doing so, “and most of those workers face no consequences,” inmates' attorneys said in a recent court filing, citing figures that officials now say are suspect.
The concern comes as new cases soar across California and state models predict a gradual increase in hospitalizations and intensive care admissions over the next month.
More than 5,100 people were hospitalized and more than 1,100 in the ICU statewide, numbers expected to climb above 7,300 and 1,300 by the end of January.
The Greater Sacramento region meanwhile joined the San Francisco Bay Area and Southern California with an Reffective that measures infection rates above 1. Anything above 1 means the number of infected persons will increase, and only the Northern California and San Joaquin Valley regions remained below 1.
Corrections officials temporarily shut off new admissions to the reception center at Wasco State Prison in the San Joaquin Valley, the site of California's worst current prison outbreak with more than 150 new infections in the past two weeks.
They also are restricting inmates' movement, programs and visitation at institutions with outbreaks. And starting Monday, inmates statewide must be fully vaccinated to have in-person or family visits, unless they have approved religious or medical exemptions.
The twice-weekly testing requirement applies to about 10,000 unvaccinated corrections employees, nearly a third of whom weren't complying from mid-october through mid-november, according to the most recent data provided by corrections officials.
Yet the state's figures show fewer than 20 employees were disciplined during the same time frame, though corrections officials said those numbers are misleading, "partly because fully vaccinated staff who are not subject to the testing requirement may show as noncompliant with testing.”
The prisons had nearly 350 active inmate coronavirus cases Thursday, up from fewer than 190 just two days earlier, with nearly half the total at the Wasco prison. There were lesser outbreaks at prisons near Norco, Corcoran, San Diego, Folsom and Chino.
There were nearly 400 new infections among prison employees statewide.
Prison officials said they have not seen an increase in hospitalizations, which have remained between one and three over the past two months statewide.
“The prisons lag behind the communities," said Steve Fama, an attorney with the nonprofit Prison Law Office that represents inmates. “The virus has to skip into the prisons, literally leap into — it's got to get over the wall, and that just takes time.”
The cases are a fraction of the system's nearly 100,000 inmates and nothing like the outbreaks last year, including one that sickened 75% of inmates at San Quentin State Prison north of San Francisco, killing 28 inmates and a correctional officer.
Since the start of the pandemic, 245 inmates and 49 corrections staff have died statewide.