Newsroom
Alabama's segregation for inmates with HIV faces court scrutiny
Septempber 17, 2012 by Verna Gates
Alabama, one of two U.S. states that segregate inmates with HIV from the rest of their prison population, will seek to defend the policy against a class action lawsuit headed to trial in federal court on Monday.
FBI Reports More Than 1.5 Million Drug Arrests Last Year
October 29, 2012 by Phillip Smith
According to annual arrest data released Monday by the FBI, more than 1.53 million people were arrested on drug charges last year, nearly nine out of ten of them for simple possession, and nearly half of them on marijuana charges.
Prisoners, hard hit by hepatitis C, decry lack of access to drugs
October 22, 2012 by Cassandra Willyard
Alabama's segregation for inmates with HIV faces court scrutiny
Septempber 17, 2012 by Verna Gates
Alabama, one of two U.S. states that segregate inmates with HIV from the rest of their prison population, will seek to defend the policy against a class action lawsuit headed to trial in federal court on Monday.
Incarceration and Health
Brad Brockmann and Josiah Rich, Fall 2012
"Communities & Banking," a publication of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
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Health care for released prisoners prevents high emergency department use
July 20, 2012 By Helen Dodson in Health
Expediting primary health care for chronically ill inmates soon after release from prison results in fewer visits to hospital emergency departments, a Yale study has found. The study is published in the American Journal of Public Health
.After Jail, Former Inmates Face Higher Death Risk
New York | March 22, 2012
Amy Norton, Reuters Health
People released from New York City jails face an increased risk of death from drug overdose, homicide or suicide -- especially in the first couple weeks of freedom, city health officials say. You can find the article here.
Drug Terms Reduced, Freeing Prisoners
U.S. | November 02, 2011
John Schwartz, New York Times
More than 1,800 prisoners are eligible for release under new sentencing rules for cocaine-related crimes that came into effect on Tuesday. You can find the article here.
Medicine and the Epidemic of Incarceration in the United States
June 2, 2011 - The New England Journal of Medicine
Josiah D. Rich, M.D., M.P.H., Sarah E. Wakeman, M.D., and Samuel L. Dickman, A.B.
"Over the past 40 years, the number of people in U.S. prisons has increased by more than 600% — an unprecedented expansion of the criminal justice system."
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Supreme Court Upholds Order to Reduce Prison Overcrowding in California
On May 23, 2011, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that conditions in California’s overcrowded prisons are so bad that they violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment, and ordered the state to reduce its prison population by more than 30,000 prisoners. Read about the ruling in The New York Times here, or read the text of the decision here. You can read more about the horrendous condition of health care delivery in the California prison system here.
The Center’s response to the ruling, written by Center Executive Director Brad Brockmann, Center Director and Professor of Medicine and Community Health Dr. Josiah Rich, and Assistant Professor of Medicine Dr. Amy Nunn, both at Brown University’s Medical School, was published in The New York Times Opinion Pages. The letter can be found here, or the entire range of responses to the decision can be read directly on the New York Times website.
Lawsuit filed in death of detainee
Jail, infirmary are accused of negligence
May 16, 2011 - Boston Globe - Maria Sacchetti, Globe Staff
"The daughter of a 49-year-old immigrant detainee who died in 2009 after an infection overwhelmed his body filed a federal lawsuit yesterday, accusing officials at the Suffolk County House of Correction and its privately run infirmary of gross negligence leading to his death."
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The Patients No One Wants
Featuring the Center's Co-Directors Dr. Jody Rich and Dr. Scott Allen. May/June 2011 - Brown Alumni Magazine - Ryan Goldberg
"On the second Tuesday in January, Professor of Medicine Josiah "Jody" Rich began his seventeenth year of weekly visits to Rhode Island's state prison, the Adult Correctional Institution (ACI). The first inmate he saw that morning was a familiar one."
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Experiments in Torture
Evidence of Human Subject Research and Experimentation in the "Enhanced" Interrogation ProgramJune 7, 2010 - Physicians for Human Rights - Scott Allen, MD, Nathaniel Raymond, et al.
"This report identifies evidence of unethical and illegal human subject experimentation conducted by US health professionals on detainees."
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ACI’s new medical chief brings a dose of activismProvidence Journal profiles the new medical director at the Rhode Island prison working closely with Center for Prisoner Health and Human Rights
May 25, 2010 - Providence Journal - John Hill
"For decades, from apartment buildings in the devastated South Bronx to a medical practice in rural Foster, Dr. Michael D. Fine has been trying to reinvent the medical-care system.
Now, he’s going to prison to do it.."
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Rhode Island leads the nation in HIV care for prisoners
The Center is described in community newspaper
January 2010 - Street Sites - William K. Harter
"Federal health experts claim Rhode Island’s human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) practices and care for our prisoners and released inmates are the best in the USA. 95% of released inmates accepting help at the Miriam Hospital get their medical care during the 1 1/2 year enrolled in the Project Bridge Program, a program designed to be a ‘bridge’ between incarceration and release."
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First, Do No Harm. Then, Make Some Noise.Center Co-Directors Josiah Rich, MD and Scott Allen, MD at the Rhode Island State House
Fall 2007 - Brown Medicine Volume 12 - Eileen O'Gara Kurtis
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