The new death penalty: latest reporting chronicles that COVID has now killed more than 2500 prisoners in the United States

I have been pleased that the encouraging slow down in the number of national COVID deaths has also been reflected in prisoner COVID death in recent times: though prisoner COVID death increased by over 100 some weeks in December and January, lately there have been only about a dozen weekly deaths reported.  However, I am still sad to be reporting that we have now passed yet another remarkable milestone in COVID prisoner deaths according to the data assembled by The Marshall Project. 

I am grateful that The Marshall Project is continuing the critical job of counting via this webpage prisoner deaths from coronavirus, reports as of Thursday, March 25, 2021 that there are now "at least 2502 deaths from coronavirus reported among prisoners."  It should come as no surprise to regular readers that we have generally seen increases and decreases in COVID cases and deaths that largely track the general population; in this particular context, prisons are very much reflective of broader community realities.   We are also seeing a relatively reduction in reports of correctional staff dying from COVID, but The Marshall Project still reports we are up to "at least 195 deaths from coronavirus reported among prison staff." 

I am hopeful that we are not far from having all incarcerated persons and staff fully vaccinated, though there are disconcerting reports of vaccines not being made available to prisoners and of prison staff refusing to get vaccinated.

A few of many prior related posts:

• The new death penalty: Marshall Project reporting COVID has now killed more than 2000 prisoners in the United States (from Jan. 2021)
• The new death penalty: COVID has now killed in nine months more US prisoners than capital punishment over last 50+ years (from Dec. 2020)
• The new death penalty: COVID has now killed more US prisoners than capital punishment over last three decades (from Nov. 2020)
• The new death penalty: COVID has now killed as many US prisoners as has a quarter century of capital punishment (from Oct 2020)
• The new death penalty: COVID has now killed more US prisoners in months than the US death penalty has in the last two decades (from Aug 2020)
• The new death penalty: COVID has now killed more US prisoners in weeks than the US death penalty has in over a decade (from May 2020)
• The new death penalty: COVID has now killed more than 500 US prisoners and prison staff according to UCLA Law data (from May 2020)
• The new death penalty: COVID now a leading modern killer of California inmates on death row 
• From drug sentences to death sentences: documenting arbitrary and capricious drug war casualties
• Memorializing more drug war casualties: updating the federal drug sentences that COVID-19 turned into death sentences 

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