Urban Health Journalism Workshop: Monitoring jail and prison health

Djenny Passé-Rodriguez
Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY

Journalists Naseem S. Miller of the Ocala Star-Banner in Florida and Courtney Gross of the Gotham Gazette in New York City joined Legal Aid Society attorney Milton Zelermeyer for a panel discussion about monitoring jail and prison health at the Urban Health Journalism Workshop on Oct. 18 in New York City.

Zelermeyer discussed how he advocates for better standards of health care in jails and prisons throughout the state. He explained why adequate health care in jails and prisons ultimately effects society at large.

"Prisons and jails can be seen as an opportunity for health intervention to treat chronic and infectious diseases to prevent their spread," Zelermeyer said.  "If you look into it from a cost benefit analysis, not taking the opportunity to treat while a person is in prison is only going to shift the cost and may increase the cost of having to deal with the problem later."

Zelermeyer also discussed the outcome of a 17-year lawsuit against the New York State Department of Corrections, in which HIV-positive inmates throughout the state's jails and prisons alleged were giving them inadequate health care.  In 2007, he won a settlement on their behalf, which entitles HIV-positive inmates access to HIV and infectious disease specialists, increased training for staff and a complaint procedure for inmates. He says that litigation can be a tool for monitoring health care because it gives advocates like him access to health records and testimonies from inmates.

Gross explained that she doesn't have the same access to medical records and facilities that attorneys with the Prisoner's Rights Project do. Her biggest obstacle in reporting about health care on Rikers Island was getting into the jail because the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene constantly denied her access, citing privacy and confidentiality issues.

Gross' article, "Barred Medicine: Health Care on Riker's Island," published in February, is about the inadequate medical services that inmates and former inmates on Riker's Island said they received.

With the help of advocacy groups in New York City, Gross was able to get in touch with former inmates. One former inmate is Casimiro, whose last name was withheld in her reporting.  He told her his biggest gripe about the health care on Riker's Island was the wait time for simple treatments, such as cough medicine or stitches for a cut. 

To accurately report on the health care issues and concerns facing the inmates, Gross relied on officials from the Department of Health and the New York City Mayor's Management Report for statistical information to balance her reporting.

"As journalists, it's important to recognize that if you're talking about sourcing, if you're talking about health care, and you're talking about covering prisons, you need to get their [inmates'] story too," said Gross. "You need to see what's accurate.  Is it the 27 minutes the mayor says that people wait or is it the seven hours that Casimiro says?"

Miller spoke about the process of writing a two-day feature called "Treating Inmates," about the health care in her local county jail, provided by Prison Health Services, a private company.  She said hundreds of letters and calls from the families of inmates prompted her to look into their complaints.  She followed up with calls to lawyers who represented inmates, advocacy groups and researched court dockets for lawsuits against the jail.

Miller says one of the biggest challenges is making readers care about these inmates.

"It's their tax dollars," Miller said. "If they [health care providers] don't take care of the inmates well, they end up getting transported to emergency rooms because of serious conditions like this guy who jumped off a balcony."

Miller told the story of a man who had been treated for a mental condition days before being imprisoned.  When his son dropped off his medication at the county jail, they rejected the medication and told him that doctors take patients off of all medication until a medical evaluation.  Two days after being admitted in the jail, he started to hallucinate and jumped off a balcony when guards entered his cell.

The panelists discussed the roll that state legislation could play in resolving mismanagement of health care in jails and prisons by promoting more accountability among correctional systems and health care companies.