“Class members at ASPC-Florence, as at other prisons, reported that they are not provided basic disinfecting cleaning solutions,” Kendrick said. Kendrick called the conditions at Florence “filthy” and “a breeding ground for infectious disease.” “When we were in Florence we talked to multiple people who said they were having flu-like symptoms, coughs, fevers, but they weren’t reporting them because they couldn’t afford to go to the nurses line,” Kendrick said. Kendrick is calling on Department of Corrections Director David Shinn to suspend that copay during the coronavirus outbreak, which she says is a barrier to care. In Arizona state prisons, inmates must pay a $4 copay to be seen by health care providers. “One of which was ‘In the past 21 days have you been to the province of Wuhan, China?’” Kendrick said. Kendrick said inmates are not having their temperatures checked, and the screening process they were shown by prison officials to be used on new inmates consisted of a piece of paper with just a few questions on it. Some asked us if it was true it was a ‘hoax,’ as they had seen people on television saying that.” “And to the extent any incarcerated person knew anything about COVID-19, it was based solely upon watching television. “There were very few educational materials, if any, at the prison,” Kendrick said. Kendrick said most of the people they spoke with were lacking basic information about how to protect themselves against infection. On March 12, Kendrick said Arizona Department of Corrections Assistant Director Richard Pratt “indicated that he had not yet seen any plans, or received any information or guidance from the Arizona Department of Health Services regarding management and prevention of COVID-19.2”ĭuring the tour of Florence, Kendrick and the other attorneys interviewed more than 500 inmates. “During our visit to ASPC-Florence, we saw crowded, filthy, unventilated dorms, tents, and Quonset huts housing elderly, frail men with chronic health conditions and multiple disabilities,” Kendrick said. Ryan settlement, which set terms to improve health care in the state’s prisons. With a team of attorneys from the Prison Law Office and the ACLU’s National Prison Project, Kendrick toured the Florence prison March 11 and 12 as part of the regular monitoring process for the Parsons v. “This is the time for bold and comprehensive action.”īut so far, Kendrick says, state officials have offered no evidence they are ready. “We are dealing with an urgent, life and death situation for tens of thousands of people (including incarcerated people, prison staff, and others in the community),” wrote PLO attorney Corene Kendrick. In a letter to legal counsel representing the Arizona Department of Corrections, attorneys from the Prison Law Office, a nonprofit law firm based in Berkeley, California, asked the state to provide a detailed plan. Arizona Department of Corrections building in Phoenix.Īttorneys representing the people incarcerated in state prisons say the Arizona Department of Corrections and its private health care provider, Centurion, are not adequately prepared for a possible coronavirus outbreak.
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