Coronavirus death toll in US could be 100,000 higher if jail populations not reduced, report finds

Mass incarceration ‘pushed to the breaking point’ during pandemic as jails could become ‘tinderbox’ for disease

The US death toll from coronavirus could spike by more than 100,000 people if jail populations are not immediately reduced during the crisis, according to a new report.

Models that have predicted the nation’s deaths from Covid-19, the disease caused by the virus, may be underestimating another 100,000 deaths, effectively doubling the projected death toll, if local jails don’t dramatically reduce the number of people in custody.

Even with significant “social distancing” guidelines and more-strict quarantine efforts in cities across the US, the nation will see a massive loss of life that has not been previously included in death projections “if no substantial action is taken to reduce jail populations”, according to a report from the American Civil Liberties Union and epidemiologists from the University of Tennessee, Washington State University and the University of Pennsylvania.

“The United States’ unique obsession with incarceration has become our Achilles heel” in the battle against coronavirus, the report claims.

Udi Ofer, director of the ACLU’s Justice Division, said that jails’ “revolving doors” have made them a “tinderbox” for spreading the disease in communities and in jails across the US.

He said: “Mass incarceration was a major public health crisis before the outbreak of Covid-19, but this pandemic has pushed it past the breaking point.”

The report pulled data from 1,200 large and mid-sized local jails. It does not include federal prisons or immigration detention centres, which have significantly higher populations also under threat of exponential increases in infections.

Nearly 740,000 people are in jails in the US on any given day, according to the report, and roughly 40 per cent of all incarcerated people have at least one chronic health condition that puts them at risk of severe illness or death from coronavirus.

The nation’s attempts to “flatten the curve” and prevent the spread of Covid-19 in its jails “are simply not feasible” while also possessing the highest incarceration rate in the world and “overcrowding and substandard conditions” in many of its jails.

Roughly 66 per cent of people in US jails are pre-trial detainees that have not been convicted of any crime while awaiting trial, and thousands of others are imprisoned because of their inability to pay the cost of bail following their arrest and arraignment. The average jail time is roughly 25 days. The ”constant movement between jails and the broader community” makes jails a “vector” for the pandemic, according to the report.

The report found that jails could “become veritable volcanoes for the spread of the virus” without immediate mitigation measures in place.

If arrests are reduced by 50 per cent, the US could save the lives of 12,000 people in jails and another 47,000 people in surrounding communities, the report says.

If arrests are stalled for everything but the most serious crimes (including murder, rape and assault) while doubling the rate of prisoner release from jails, the US could save the lives of 23,000 people in jails and another 76,000 people in nearby communities, according to the report.

Every week of delayed action to reduce jail populations could mean a difference of as many as 18,000 lives, the report says.