Monroe COVID crisis raises questions about prisons

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

By Tom Burke / Herald columnist

I’ve decided not to write about coronavirus. It’s been beaten to death, and I won’t pile on.

But something coronavirus-linked; a recent protest by inmates at the Monroe Minimum Security Unit, got me questioning prisons, and how they work.

Both inmates and employees in that perfect pandemic incubator had been diagnosed with COVID-19; and the virus’s presence profoundly frightened those serving out their sentence. They saw, at the time of the protest, little-to-nothing being done to protect them. As news stories reported, state Department of Correction employees and inmates were not consistently wearing masks. There was no real social distancing (it’s impossible in the confined spaces of the institution). Stress levels inside were in the red zone (due to short staffing and fear). And DOC employees, who were coming into the prison from outside where the disease was raging, were not being tested unless they reported sick

In short, everything the governor was telling us-on-the-outside to do, was not being done on the inside. The men there felt their lives were on the line. So they protested.

https://www.heraldnet.com/opinion/burke-monroe-covid-crisis-raises-questions-about-prisons/?utm_source=DAILY+HERALD&utm_campaign=cd79270213-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_d81d073bb4-cd79270213-228635337

[iemitsu]

1. The rest of us in America feel as if little to nothing is being done to

protect us either. It's not just prisons, our whole structure is designed to only protect the very rich.