Inadequate Healthcare and Conditions in Prisons

1319 Words3 Pages

Another problem with prisons are the terrible conditions and poor medical supervision that is provided. Diseases can be spread easily in highly populated prisons so it is highly recommended that prison facilities are clean and hold prisoners to their made capacity. These conditions can even affect prisoners long-term. Some prisoners have shown to have psychological problems because of the conditions they experienced in prisons. Prisons are created to reform prisoners, not harm them. Health care in prisons has been a problem for many years. It got so serious at one point, that in 1972, a Health Advisory Committee was set up to commend the matters affecting the health of prisoners. This committee gave prisons standards to follow, but prisons …show more content…

This is what Tommy Winfrey, an inmate from San Quentin State Prison, believes: “When society locks an individual away and doesn’t provide some means by which the offender can understand why he/she committed crimes in the first place, then there will be no corrective behavior. I never gained insight from being placed in a cell. Instead I just became defensive and tried to rationalize my behavior. That being said, I believe the success to rehabilitation begins with education. When I began to attend college, I started to discover some things about myself. I began to learn I didn’t have all the answers in life. Vocational training has also given me confidence that I do not have to depend on crime to support myself”. Educating prisoners would be the best way to lower recidivism rates and possibly crime rates. Prisoners need guidance and training so that when they are released they have a plan to follow. If prisons just continue to punish them, they will not learn what they should be doing and go back to their old habits. The must be given an opportunity to heal and learn so they could understand the dynamics in their life which led them to the crime they committed. There are countless interviews of ex-inmates and most of them believe education in prison is a necessity. They want a chance to learn and get a job so that they could provide for themselves. Exposing them to programs will benefit them because the recidivism rate will go down and potentially crime

Open Document