NCJ Number
179789
Journal
American Jails Volume: 13 Issue: 4 Dated: September/October 1999 Pages: 82-85
Date Published
October 1999
Length
4 pages
Annotation
At the 12th International AIDS Conference in Geneva, Switzerland, in July 1998, numerous reports addressed the pandemic of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection among those incarcerated in the world's prisons and jails.
Abstract
Countries represented at the conference included Cote d'Ivoire, Nigeria, Zambia, Republic of South Africa, India, Pakistan, Nepal, Europe (England, France, Germany, Sweden, Portugal, Italy, Belgium, Spain, Scotland, and Switzerland), Brazil, Argentina, Canada, and the United States. Conference participants presented considerable evidence that correctional facilities serve as major reservoirs of HIV infection, hepatitis, and tuberculosis and that unprotected sexual intercourse and injection drug use in overcrowded correctional facilities perpetuate public health dilemmas. In addition, conference participants recommended that correctional staff and inmates, including inmate peer-educator-counselors, be educated and that prophylaxis treatment and harm reduction initiatives be implemented by correctional facilities. 1 reference