Prisoners, Their Rights and Reformation

Hiv and Medical Privacy: Government Infringement on Prisoners' Constitutional Rights

The high rate of HIV infection among Americans, the ease with which the virus is transmitted, and the terminal nature of the virus have made its existence a vital national public health issue.' Concern regarding HIV is heightened in U.S. correctional facilities, in which the prevalence of the virus is disproportionately high.2 As of December 31, 2003, 1.9% of the total U.S. prison population wa...

The rights of non-HIV- and HIV-positive prisoners.

Prisoners who inject drugs: public health and human rights imperatives.

This article examines the human rights and public health implications of injection drug use in prisons with a specific focus on HIV and hepatitis C (HCV) viruses. The authors argue that prisoners who inject drugs have a right to access harm reduction measures--those that reduce the harmful consequences of drug use without necessarily reducing drug consumption. Moreover, states that fulfill thei...

Castration of sex offenders: prisoners' rights versus public safety.

Sexual victimization of children and adults is a significant treatment and public policy problem in the United States. To address increasing concerns regarding sex offender recidivism, nine states have passed legislation since 1996 authorizing the use of either chemical or physical castration. In most statutes, a repeat offender's eligibility for probation or parole is linked to acceptance of m...

Fighting for their rights.

“I was now a resident, or rather an inmate, of the hospital,” says a mental health service user, of their experience in an institution. “I saw no one except the other people on the floor, who wore identical striped hospital robes and plastic bracelets with identifying names. The mental health workers were the only ones who could open the locked door. I left my hope on the other side of the lock...