EDITORIAL
The Philippine government has not fully reported prison deaths,
raising concerns that Covid-19 is spreading more quickly and widely in the country’s
detention facilities, according to Human Rights Watch.
“Authorities should investigate prison deaths and take urgent measures to
better protect prisoners, including by reducing
prison populations to allow for social distancing and other prevention measures,” HRW reported.
Five inmates interviewed
separately told Human Rights Watch recently that since March 25, at least seven
inmates have died in the Quezon City Jail and one in
the Cavite Provincial Jail. Human Rights Watch could not determine whether the
deaths were Covid-19 related because of the absence of testing in the
facilities and the government’s failure to report them.
A criminal justice expert and a nongovernmental monitoring group
believe more deaths have occurred in the country’s prisons and jails than the
government has disclosed publicly.
“Unreported deaths of
inmates show the urgent need for the Duterte government to be transparent about the spread of Covid-19 inside the country’s
overcrowded prisons,” said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch.
“The government should get serious about the terrible
situation in its prisons and jails and accurately report on prison deaths and
illness.”
Several inmates at the Quezon City Jail told Human Rights Watch
by telephone that possible Covid-19 cases at the facility appear to be
increasing. “We have at least one death a week since the outbreak, which is
higher than usual,” said an inmate with duties as a
“medical aide” inside the overcrowded jail. Another medical aide and other
inmates corroborated this account.
An inmate in the Cavite
Provincial Jail told Human Rights Watch that a Nigerian man in his 40s died
during the first week of April. He said the man later
was found to have had Covid-19.
A medical staff member in
the warden’s office confirmed the death, but provided no other details except
that the warden “has already reported it to the governor and the DILG,” the
Department of the Interior and Local Government.
The inmate said four
prisoners carried the body out of the jail with little protective medical
equipment, a common practice for medical aides. Medical aides fill in for some
roles of nurses and doctors inside the jail, such as taking temperatures. These duties have increased as the virus outbreak
has stretched the already inadequate number of medical personnel, and because
staff consider them safe to mingle with the general prison population.
“We had a mask on and a
pair of gloves but that’s it,” a medical aide at the
Quezon City Jail told HRW
about taking the body to a waiting ambulance for transfer to a morgue. Another
detainee said that while the nurses at the Quezon City Jail wore proper
protective gear, medical aides only received a face
mask and gloves.
The World Health
Organization (WHO) recommends that people
transferring bodies of those who have died from suspected or confirmed Covid-19 should use protective equipment,
including a gown, gloves, face shield, and goggles, or other facial protection.
The inmate said social
distancing was impossible inside the jail, prisoners lacked nutritious food,
and that only about a quarter of the prisoners were
wearing face masks.
“Inmates painted a
harrowing picture of health conditions inside the overcrowded jails,” Robertson
said. “Failing to give adequate protection to the inmates ordered to help
prison medical staff is cruel beyond belief.”
The inmate said that,
based on the number of detainees at the Quezon City Jail who have been moved to
an isolation ward outside the facility and changes in jail personnel, as many
as 20 detainees and 19 jail staff are believed to have been infected as of April 23.
“We pity the old
detainees especially because we don’t know where to isolate them,” the inmate
said. “Many of them have a hard time breathing, some have fever.” A detainee
over 60 years old said, “The prisoners here are pitiful. There’s practically no space for us to sleep properly. Even
the plaza outside our cells is occupied. They don’t care about us.”
All the detainees
interviewed said their cell leaders handed down explicit instructions not to
disclose detainee deaths to relatives, the public, or
the media.
Human Rights Watch and
Philippine human rights groups concerned about outbreaks of Covid-19 in
the country’s prisons and jails have urged the government to release prisoners
who face charges for low-level, non-violent crimes, including older people and
those with underlying medical conditions.
The Supreme Court, in
response to a petition filed by sick and older
prisoners, directed lower courts to expedite such releases. However, solicitor
general, Jose Calida, blocked the petition stating, “While it is true that some
of the detention and reformatory facilities in the country are highly congested, unfortunately, congestion in prison facilities is
not among the grounds to release inmates.”
“The Philippines is
facing a real catastrophe if nothing is done to improve the dire health and
overcrowding situation in its jails,” Robertson said. “The government needs to release vulnerable prisoners
immediately and ensure that the medical needs of the remaining detainees are
met.”
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