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Excess mortality in U.S. prisons during the COVID-19 pandemic

U.S. prisons were especially susceptible to COVID-19 infection and death; however, data limitations have precluded a national accounting of prison mortality (including but not limited to COVID-19 mortality) during the pandemic. Our analysis of mortality data collected from public records requests (s...

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Autores principales: Sugie, Naomi F., Turney, Kristin, Reiter, Keramet, Tublitz, Rebecca, Kaiser, Daniela, Goodsell, Rebecca, Secrist, Erin, Patil, Ankita, Jiménez, Monik
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: American Association for the Advancement of Science 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10691764/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/38039371
http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adj8104
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author Sugie, Naomi F.
Turney, Kristin
Reiter, Keramet
Tublitz, Rebecca
Kaiser, Daniela
Goodsell, Rebecca
Secrist, Erin
Patil, Ankita
Jiménez, Monik
author_facet Sugie, Naomi F.
Turney, Kristin
Reiter, Keramet
Tublitz, Rebecca
Kaiser, Daniela
Goodsell, Rebecca
Secrist, Erin
Patil, Ankita
Jiménez, Monik
author_sort Sugie, Naomi F.
collection PubMed
description U.S. prisons were especially susceptible to COVID-19 infection and death; however, data limitations have precluded a national accounting of prison mortality (including but not limited to COVID-19 mortality) during the pandemic. Our analysis of mortality data collected from public records requests (supplemented with publicly available data) from 48 Departments of Corrections provides the most comprehensive understanding to date of in-custody mortality during 2020. We find that total mortality increased by 77% in 2020 relative to 2019, corresponding to 3.4 times the mortality increase in the general population, and that mortality in prisons increased across all age groups (49 and under, 50 to 64, and 65 and older). COVID-19 was the primary driver for increases in mortality due to natural causes; some states also experienced substantial increases due to unnatural causes. These findings provide critical information about the pandemic’s toll on some of the country’s most vulnerable individuals while underscoring the need for data transparency and standardized reporting in carceral settings.
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spelling pubmed-106917642023-12-02 Excess mortality in U.S. prisons during the COVID-19 pandemic Sugie, Naomi F. Turney, Kristin Reiter, Keramet Tublitz, Rebecca Kaiser, Daniela Goodsell, Rebecca Secrist, Erin Patil, Ankita Jiménez, Monik Sci Adv Social and Interdisciplinary Sciences U.S. prisons were especially susceptible to COVID-19 infection and death; however, data limitations have precluded a national accounting of prison mortality (including but not limited to COVID-19 mortality) during the pandemic. Our analysis of mortality data collected from public records requests (supplemented with publicly available data) from 48 Departments of Corrections provides the most comprehensive understanding to date of in-custody mortality during 2020. We find that total mortality increased by 77% in 2020 relative to 2019, corresponding to 3.4 times the mortality increase in the general population, and that mortality in prisons increased across all age groups (49 and under, 50 to 64, and 65 and older). COVID-19 was the primary driver for increases in mortality due to natural causes; some states also experienced substantial increases due to unnatural causes. These findings provide critical information about the pandemic’s toll on some of the country’s most vulnerable individuals while underscoring the need for data transparency and standardized reporting in carceral settings. American Association for the Advancement of Science 2023-12-01 /pmc/articles/PMC10691764/ /pubmed/38039371 http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adj8104 Text en Copyright © 2023 The Authors, some rights reserved; exclusive licensee American Association for the Advancement of Science. No claim to original U.S. Government Works. Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 (CC BY). https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Social and Interdisciplinary Sciences
Sugie, Naomi F.
Turney, Kristin
Reiter, Keramet
Tublitz, Rebecca
Kaiser, Daniela
Goodsell, Rebecca
Secrist, Erin
Patil, Ankita
Jiménez, Monik
Excess mortality in U.S. prisons during the COVID-19 pandemic
title Excess mortality in U.S. prisons during the COVID-19 pandemic
title_full Excess mortality in U.S. prisons during the COVID-19 pandemic
title_fullStr Excess mortality in U.S. prisons during the COVID-19 pandemic
title_full_unstemmed Excess mortality in U.S. prisons during the COVID-19 pandemic
title_short Excess mortality in U.S. prisons during the COVID-19 pandemic
title_sort excess mortality in u.s. prisons during the covid-19 pandemic
topic Social and Interdisciplinary Sciences
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10691764/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/38039371
http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adj8104
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