Florida prisons still are not protecting inmates, communities from COVID-19’s surge
As Florida sees another spike in COVID-19 cases, driven by the even-more-contagious delta variant, it’s important that all government agencies take steps to protect all Floridians. Instead, the Florida Department of Corrections is acting as if the pandemic is over, posing a grave danger to people in prisons and surrounding communities.
Right now, Florida has the highest rate of new COVID-19 infections of any state. Cases are up by almost 23% in the past two weeks, and deaths are up by a shocking 83%.
But you wouldn’t know it from the actions of the Florida Department of Corrections, which appears to believe the pandemic is over even as hospitalizations across the state are on the rise. The agency has declared a return to “normal, non-emergency operations.” Masks are now optional for corrections staff, visitors and people incarcerated in state prisons, despite CDC guidance that people continue to wear masks in correctional facilities. DOC has not updated public data on COVID transmission and deaths for nearly two months.
People incarcerated in Florida prisons already have paid a high price for the agency’s failures throughout the pandemic. Our analysis of deaths in Florida prisons reveals that, between 2019 and 2020, life expectancy for incarcerated people in Florida dropped by four years, with thebulk of deaths occurring in people aged 55 and older. This is considerably larger than the already catastrophic 18-month decline in life expectancy across the United States, reported by the CDC.
The striking difference in years lost that we identified between free and incarcerated Americans highlights the need for increased health protections for people in jails and prisons, who often do not have access to basic hygiene supplies, such as soap or masks, and cannot practice social distancing. It is also a reflection of the dangerous and inhumane conditions faced by more than 1.7 million people — most of whom are Black and Latinx — in U.S. prisons.
At least 2,700 people have died from COVID-19 in state and federal prisons so far.
The ongoing catastrophe in Florida prisons is no surprise to advocates and public health experts: Since the early days of the pandemic, medical experts have urged prison officials to reduce the number of people in prison, pointing out that many could be safely released and that meaningfully reducing the incarcerated population was the most effective way to reduce viral spread and create the possibility of social distancing inside.
In response, Florida officials claimed their hands were tied.
To make matters worse, vaccination rates among incarcerated people and prison workers are almost certainly still woefully inadequate to protect those who live and work behind prison walls. The Department of Corrections is in the minority of state systems not publicly reporting its vaccination rates for those incarcerated or employed. A recent media inquiry estimated that around 40% of incarcerated people nationally are vaccinated. To our knowledge, no estimate for staff vaccination rates exists, but an early survey of FLDOC corrections staff indicated that more than half said that they would not get the vaccine.
If correct, this is a far cry from the White House’s target vaccination rate of 70% for the country as a whole. The delta variant is even more contagious than previous strains of COVID-19, and unvaccinated people who work in prisons carry the infectious virus into the prisons and back home to their families and communities each day. The largely unvaccinated people who live and work in Florida prisons are likely once again to become a primary source of viral spread in their communities, not to mention a possible source of new strains.
The Florida DOC was regularly updating COVID-19 cases and deaths via an online dashboard, but its reporting stopped abruptly on June 2, 2021. The agency’s silence could now be concealing a COVID-19 resurgence in Florida’s state prisons. Department of Corrections officials should immediately resume tracking and reporting COVID cases.
Without concerted steps to gain control of COVID-19 in Florida’s prisons — including expanded prison healthcare, mass vaccinations, the resumption of tracking and reporting data and meaningful efforts to reduce the number of people in prison — COVID-19 will remain a deadly threat to people living and working in prisons, as well as to every person who works inside, and to the communities they return to each day.