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As one of "the advocates," I need to clarify what happened. We pushed very hard for prisoners to be HIGHER in the priority list. Prisoners who are permanently housed in prison health care units should be vaccinated at the same time as all residents of health care facilities. 1/7 https://twitter.com/MarkMaxwellTV/status/1351064477060501504
Prisoner who work in health care units (for example, aids who clean and otherwise care for prisoners unable to care for themselves) should be vaccinated at the same time as other health care workers--as required by the CDC guidelines 2/7
Prisoners who are elderly and have pre-existing conditions who make them especially vulnerable should they contract COVID should be vaccinated at the same time as all others in this category. 3/7
But none of this happened. Prisoners in these categories have been discriminated against, and left unprotected in extremely dangerous conditions--and many have died. Instead, all prisoners have been lumped together, in one big category, along with other prion staff. 4/7
Thus, many prisoners have been moved DOWN in the priority list, not up. And this was done despite the fact that prisoners live in very close quarters, and have no ability to protect themselves via social distancing, isolation, etc. 5/7
When a prisoner becomes seriously ill with COVID, they are transferred to local hospitals and compete for ICU space & ventilators with the rest of the community. In many rural areas, were COVID to spread in nearby prisons, they would rapidly run out of ICU beds & ventilators 6/7
Finally, it is vital to note that the prison population is not static. Every week, about 500 people are released from prison into the community. Stopping the spread of COVID in the prisons is absolutely vital to protecting the community as a whole 7/end
