CCWORK protocol: a longitudinal study of Canadian Correctional Workers’ Well-being, Organizations, Roles and Knowledge

IntroductionKnowledge about the factors that contribute to the correctional officer’s (CO) mental health and well-being, or best practices for improving the mental health and well-being of COs, have been hampered by the dearth of rigorous longitudinal studies. In the current protocol, we share the approach used in the Canadian Correctional Workers’ Well-being, Organizations, Roles and Knowledge study (CCWORK), designed to investigate several determinants of health and well-being among COs working in Canada’s federal prison system.Methods and analysisCCWORK is a multiyear longitudinal cohort design (2018–2023, with a 5-year renewal) to study 500 COs working in 43 Canadian federal prisons. We use quantitative and qualitative data collection instruments (ie, surveys, interviews and clinical assessments) to assess participants’ mental health, correctional work experiences, correctional training experiences, views and perceptions of prison and prisoners, and career aspirations. Our baseline instruments comprise two surveys, one interview and a clinical assessment, which we administer when participants are still recruits in training. Our follow-up instruments refer to a survey, an interview and a clinical assessment, which are conducted yearly when participants have become COs, that is, in annual ‘waves’.Ethics and disseminationCCWORK has received approval from the Research Ethics Board of the Memorial University of Newfoundland (File No. 20190481). Participation is voluntary, and we will keep all responses confidential. We will disseminate our research findings through presentations, meetings and publications (e.g., journal articles and reports). Among CCWORK’s expected scientific contributions, we highlight a detailed view of the operational, organizational and environmental stressors impacting CO mental health and well-being, and recommendations to prison administrators for improving CO well-being.

Is There a Temporal Relationship between COVID-19 Infections among Prison Staff, Incarcerated Persons and the Larger Community in the United States?

Background: Our objective was to examine the temporal relationship between COVID-19 infections among prison staff, incarcerated individuals, and the general population in the county where the prison is located among federal prisons in the United States. Methods: We employed population-standardized regressions with fixed effects for prisons to predict the number of active cases of COVID-19 among incarcerated persons using data from the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) for the months of March to December in 2020 for 63 prisons. Results: There is a significant relationship between the COVID-19 prevalence among staff, and through them, the larger community, and COVID-19 prevalence among incarcerated persons in the US federal prison system. When staff rates are low or at zero, COVID-19 incidence in the larger community continues to have an association with COVID-19 prevalence among incarcerated persons, suggesting possible pre-symptomatic and asymptomatic transmission by staff. Masking policies slightly reduced COVID-19 prevalence among incarcerated persons, though the association between infections among staff, the community, and incarcerated persons remained significant and strong. Conclusion: The relationship between COVID-19 infections among staff and incarcerated persons shows that staff is vital to infection control, and correctional administrators should also focus infection containment efforts on staff, in addition to incarcerated persons.

The Testimonios of System-Impacted Daughters of Color on Healing from Parental Incarceration

1 in every 25 children in the United States currently has a parent incarcerated in jail or prison. Black and Latinx children make up the majority of this population, as their parents are overrepresented in local jails and state and federal prisons. Parental incarceration affects a child’s behavior, emotional and mental health, social interaction, and financial stability. Daughters of incarcerated parents are particularly affected. This research investigates testimonios (testimonies), a narrative form of counter-storytelling, as a tool to address the traumatic effect of parental incarceration on female children of color. Testimonios give a person agency and allow them to share their unique and nuanced experiences in detail. In-depth interviews demonstrated that testimonios can be an effective healing tool for women who have been impacted by parental incarceration and can improve social service organizations directed towards families affected by incarceration. Testimonios provided space in which daughters of incarcerated parents were able to express their emotions and make sense of their experiences. The interviews also revealed shared themes in the experiences of multiple interviewees.

A Study of SARS-COV-2 Outbreaks in US Federal Prisons: the Linkage Between Staff, Inmate, and Community Transmission

BackgroundSince the novel coronavirus SARS-COV-2 was first identified to be circulating in the US on January 20, 2020, some of the worst outbreaks have occurred within state and federal prisons. The vulnerability of inmate populations, and the additional threats posed to the health of prison staff and the people they contact in surrounding communities underline the need to better understand the dynamics of transmission in the inter-linked inmate/staff/community sub-populations to better inform optimal control of SARS-COV-2.MethodsWe examined SARS-CoV-2 case data from 101 non-administrative federal prisons between 5/18/2020 to 01/31/2021 and examined the per capita size of outbreaks in staff and inmates compared to outbreaks in the communities in the counties surrounding the prisons during the summer and winter waves of the SARS-COV-2 pandemic. We also examined the impact of decarceration, comparing inmate, staff and community SARS-COV-2 outbreak sizes during the winter wave to the summer wave.ResultsFor both the summer and winter waves we found significant inter-correlations between per capita rates in the outbreaks among inmates, staff, and the community.Over-all during the pandemic, per capita rates were significantly higher in inmates than in both the staff and community (paired Student’s t-test p=0.03 and p<0.001, respectively). Per capita rates of inmate outbreaks depended significantly on security level, ranked from lowest to highest: High, Minimum, Medium, and Low security (population standardized Negative Binomial factor regression p=0.02).Federal prisons decreased the number of inmates by a relative factor of 96% comparing the winter to summer wave (one SD range [90%,102%]). Prisons with relative decarceration below the mean had significantly lower ratio of winter to summer per capita rates in inmates, and also in the surrounding counties (two-sided Student’s t-test p=0.04 and p=0.02, respectively). To our knowledge, this is the first analysis to examine the impact of decarceration on community rates of SARS-COV-2 transmission. ConclusionsWe found significant evidence of community/staff/inmate inter-linkage of SARS-COV-2 transmission. Decarceration ameliorates both prison and community SARS-COV-2 per capita rates. Further study is warranted to determine which control measures aimed at inmates and/or staff are most efficacious at preventing or controlling outbreaks.

(In)-justice: An exploration of the dehumanization, victimization, criminalization, and over-incarceration of Indigenous women in Canada

Indigenous women are vastly overrepresented in Canada’s federal prisons and represent the fastest growing prison population in Canada. This critical commentary utilizes a decolonial framework to examine how being Indigenous and female increases one’s risk of being victimized, murdered, and subject to colonial control by exploring the connections between the construction of Indigenous women as less than human and the use of carceral space to control, destroy, and assimilate this population. Specifically, the authors apply Woolford and Gacek’s notion of genocidal carcerality to the intersectional forces of systemic racism and discrimination that result in their overincarceration. Further, the article critiques the Indigenization of Canada’s federal correctional service for failing to meet the needs of this population and for perpetuating an assimilative and stereotypical portrayal of Indigenous women that perpetuates colonial harm.

Forever Prisoners

The United States locks up more than half a million non-citizens every year for immigration-related offenses; on any given day, more than 50,000 immigrants are held in detention in hundreds of ICE detention facilities spread across the country. This book provides an explanation of how, where, and why non-citizens were put behind bars in the United States from the late nineteenth century to the present. Through select granular experiences of detention over the course of more than 140 years, this book explains how America built the world’s largest system for imprisoning immigrants. From the late nineteenth century, when the US government held hundreds of Chinese in federal prisons pending deportation, to the early twentieth century, when it caged hundreds of thousands of immigrants in insane asylums, to World Wars I and II, when the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) declared tens of thousands of foreigners “enemy aliens” and locked them up in Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) camps in Texas and New Mexico, and through the 1980s detention of over 125,000 Cuban and almost 23,000 Haitian refugees, the incarceration of foreigners nationally has ebbed and flowed. In the last three decades, tough-on-crime laws intersected with harsh immigration policies to make millions of immigrants vulnerable to deportation based on criminal acts, even minor ones, that had been committed years or decades earlier. Although far more immigrants are being held in prison today than at any other time in US history, earlier moments of immigrant incarceration echo present-day patterns.

Providing Ethical and Humane Care to Hospitalized, Incarcerated Patients With COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic is devastating the health of hundreds of thousands of people who live and work in U.S. jails and prisons. Due to dozens of large outbreaks in correctional facilities, tens of thousands of seriously ill incarcerated people are receiving medical care in the community hospital setting. Yet community clinicians often have little knowledge of the basic rights and ethical principles governing care of seriously ill incarcerated patients. Such patients are legally entitled to make their own medical decisions just like non-incarcerated patients, and retain rights to appoint surrogate decision makers and make advance care plans. Wardens, correctional officers, and prison health care professionals should not make medical decisions for incarcerated patients and should not be asked to do so. Dying incarcerated patients should be offered goodbye visits with their loved ones, and patients from federal prisons are legally entitled to them. Community health care professionals may need to advocate for this medically vulnerable hospitalized patient population to receive ethically appropriate, humane care when under their care in community hospitals. If ethical care is being obstructed, community health care professionals should contact the prison’s warden and medical director to explain their concerns and ask questions. If necessary, community clinicians should involve a hospital’s ethics committee, leadership, and legal counsel. Correctional medicine experts and legal advocates for incarcerated people can also help community clinicians safeguard the rights of incarcerated patients.

A time-series analysis of testing and COVID-19 outbreaks in Canadian federal prisons to inform prevention and surveillance efforts

Background: Approximately 14,000 adults are currently incarcerated in federal prisons in Canada. These facilities are vulnerable to disease outbreaks and an assessment of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) testing and outcomes is needed. The objective of this study was to examine outcomes of COVID-19 testing, prevalence, case recovery and death within federal prisons and to contrast these data with those of the general population. Methods: Public time-series outcome data for prisoners and the general population were obtained on-line from the Correctional Service of Canada and the Public Health Agency of Canada, respectively, from March 30 to May 27, 2020. Prison, province and sex-specific frequency statistics for each outcome were calculated. A total of 50 facilities were included in this study. Results: Of these 50 facilities, 64% reported fewer individuals tested per 1,000 population than observed in the general population and 12% reported zero tests in the study period. Testing tended to be reactive, increasing only once prisons had recorded positive tests. Six prisons reported viral outbreaks, with three recording over 20% cumulative COVID-19 prevalence among prisoners. Cumulatively, in prisons, 29% of individuals tested received a positive result, compared to 6% in the general population. Two of the 360 cases died (0.6% fatality). Four outbreaks appeared to be under control (more than 80% of cases recovered); however, sizeable susceptible populations remain at risk of infection. Female prisoners (5% of the total prisoner population) were over-represented among cases (17% of cases overall). Conclusion: Findings suggest that prison environments are vulnerable to widespread severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) transmission. Gaps in testing merit public health attention. Symptom-based testing alone may not be optimal in prisons, given observations of widespread transmission. Increased sentinel or universal testing may be appropriate. Increased testing, along with rigorous infection prevention practices and the potential release of prisoners, will be needed to curb future outbreaks.

Sexual and Reproductive Health Outcomes among Incarcerated Women in Canada: A Scoping Review

Background Women are the fastest growing population in Canadian prisons. Incarceration can limit access to essential health services, increase health risks and disrupt treatment and supports. Despite legal requirements to provide care at professionally accepted standards, evidence suggests imprisonment undermines sexual and reproductive health. This scoping review asks, “What is known about the sexual and reproductive health of people incarcerated in prisons for women in Canada?” Methods We use the Joanna Briggs Institute methodology for systematic scoping reviews. Databases searched include MEDLINE, CINAHL, PsycINFO, Gender Studies Abstracts, Google Scholar and Proquest Dissertations and grey literature. The search yielded 1424 titles and abstracts of which 15 met the criteria for inclusion. Results Conducted from 1994–2020, in provincial facilities in Ontario, British Columbia, Alberta and Quebec as well as federal prisons, the 15 studies included qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods. The most common outcomes of interest were related to HIV. Other outcomes studied included Papanicolaou (Pap) and sexually transmitted infection (STI) testing, contraception, pregnancy, birth/neonatal outcomes, and sexual assault. Conclusion Incarceration results in lack of access to basic services including contraception and prenatal care. Legal obligations to provide sexual and reproductive health services at professionally acceptable standards appear unmet. Incarceration impedes rights of incarcerated people to sexual and reproductive health.

Prison Education in the United States of America

The United States of America ranks third among the most populous countries in the world behind India and China. However, the US ranks first among countries with the most prison population. Recent statistics from the Office of Justice program in the US Department of Justice show that about 2.5 million people are locked up in prisons or the so-called correctional facilities across the United States. These facilities are made up of nearly 2000 state prisons scattered among the 50 states, 102 federal prisons, about 2300 and 3300 juvenile prisons and local jails respectively, including 79 Indian Country jails (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2016; Wagner & Rabuy, 2015). This chapter looks at the state of prison education in the US through the prism of racism. However, the chapter does not claim to have a complete evaluation of the situation of learning and teaching in penitentiaries in the US.