{"id":79655,"date":"2021-03-16T11:00:48","date_gmt":"2021-03-16T11:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/?p=348371"},"modified":"2021-03-16T11:00:48","modified_gmt":"2021-03-16T11:00:48","slug":"feeble-pandemic-protections-at-private-texas-prison-leave-people-fearing-death-behind-bars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2021\/03\/16\/feeble-pandemic-protections-at-private-texas-prison-leave-people-fearing-death-behind-bars\/","title":{"rendered":"Feeble Pandemic Protections at Private Texas Prison Leave People Fearing Death Behind Bars"},"content":{"rendered":"
In early March<\/u>, a group of inspectors from the Bureau of Prisons visited the privately run Federal Correctional Institution Big Spring in Howard County, Texas. According to two people incarcerated there, prison staff ordered them to wear masks \u2014 even though they hadn\u2019t been given new ones in weeks and were not otherwise being required to wear them. Despite various requests to speak with the BOP inspectors, they claim that no one from their unit was allowed to do so.<\/p>\n
In correspondence and interviews with The Intercept, however, several people currently incarcerated at Big Spring described a careless response to the spread of the virus at the prison, where hundreds of people have so far contracted Covid-19.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we would tell the doctor \u2018hey, we\u2019re sick,\u2019 they didn\u2019t want to report that there were people with Covid in here,\u201d wrote Alexander, who\u2019s been imprisoned at the facility for seven years on a drug offense. \u201cThat\u2019s how they operate, they don\u2019t tell the [Bureau of Prisons] that there\u2019s Covid here, because the BOP is going to send people, keep doing transfers here.\u201d<\/p>\n
When he first asked for a Covid-19 test in November, Alexander said, \u201cthey were telling me \u2018no, no, what you have is a cold.\u2019 What do you mean a cold, my back hurts, I don\u2019t have a sense of smell.\u201d By the time the prison made testing available, most of his wing was sick. (Alexander and other incarcerated people are being identified pseudonymously at their request to avoid retaliation.)<\/p>\n
Others incarcerated at the prison spoke of general health and sanitation hazards, exacerbated by the extreme weather conditions<\/a> in the state that cut off the prison\u2019s water supply in mid-February. For two weeks following the inclement weather, several detained people said that they were unable to bathe and were using a large plastic bag as a communal toilet. Alfredo Echevarr\u00eda R\u00edos said that the three daily bottles of water he and others were getting weren\u2019t enough to drink, brush their teeth, wash their hands, and clean themselves. \u201cI\u2019m full of parasites, I\u2019m going to the bathroom six times a day, there\u2019s even blood [in my stool], and they don\u2019t care at all,\u201d he said, referring to prison staff.<\/p>\n