Prisoners in a pandemic: We should think about detainees during Covid-19 outbreak

In Italy, where the Covid-19 emergency developed immediately after China, the spread of the pandemic has highlighted some unsolved problems inherent to the prison system. This theme is already, unfortunately, of distressing topicality. Among these, the complex balance between the security needs and the protection of the prisoner’s right to health deserves particular attention. The detainees, in fact, constitute a group particularly vulnerable to the spread of an infectious disease, both because they have an average level of health lower than that of the general population, and because they live forced in cramped, overcrowded, poorly ventilated environments, in which it is not always possible to observe the general hygiene rules. For these reasons, during the ongoing pandemic emergency, it could be even more difficult to concretely protect the right to health of this portion of the population.