California's oldest prison, San Quentin, has become a spectacular hotbed of coronavirus. The cases of Covid-19 recently exploded in this prison center where more than a thousand detainees tested positive, local authorities said.
"This is one of our deep concerns right now," said Governor Gavin Newsom, noting that 42% of the approximately 3,500 inmates in San Quentin prison near San Francisco are considered " medically fragile ”.
Prisoner transfers involved
Unlike other state prisons, San Quentin had been spared from the coronavirus until the beginning of June. But transfers of prisoners from severely affected establishments like Chino's have likely sparked the epidemic.
"Unfortunately, they arrived without being tested and were placed in San Quentin," Dr Matt Willis, director of health for the county of Marin where the prison is located, told NPR radio.
The Chino Men's Detention Center near Los Angeles was a home known to Covid-19 at the start of the epidemic. Over 500 detainees to date have tested positive there, and sixteen have died.
Early releases to avoid excess mortality
San Quentin prison now represents half of the cases of Covid-19 in prisons in California, the most populous state in the United States but also one of the most affected by the epidemic with more than 200,000 cases confirmed and nearly 6,000 deaths.
To avoid excess mortality among prisoners, the authorities decided to early release some 3,500 detainees, convicted of minor crimes and having less than 180 days in prison to serve.
Governor Newsom announced Monday that 3,500 other potential candidates for the measure have been identified, including 110 in San Quentin. In total, California’s prison population is approximately 113,000.
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