Last year, almost two-thirds of the HIV-positive people incarcerated at Fulton County Jail in Georgia lacked HIV medication, Blavity is reporting. To put this into perspective, as recently as October, only 40 percent of individuals were receiving the appropriate HIV medication. While in August around 70 percent of HIV-positive inmates were receiving the appropriate HIV medications, by October that figure was down to 40 percent.
So why are so many people suddenly going without their medications?
Tracy Flanagan, the spokesperson for the Fulton County Sheriff’s Office, pushed back on these allegations, saying, “The doctor determines who is prescribed what. The population is constantly changing, which affects the numbers.”
Fulton has the second-highest rate of new HIV diagnoses in the country in counties with populations of 100,000 or more, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Spokesperson Stephanie Coleman also pushed back in defense of the jail, saying, “These patients are currently cared for by our full-time infectious disease nurse practitioner with support from our on-site doctors, corporate chief medical officer, and a consulting infectious disease doctor.”
According to the county, the jail housed an average of 2,500 inmates each per month last year. Of these inmates, almost 200 per month were HIV-positive, as reported by Project Q. To put this into perspective, this is equal to about seven percent of the inmate population.
What do the rates of HIV look like in jails across the country? According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, about 1.5 percent of all inmates (in both state and federal prisons) have HIV or AIDS. This comes in at about four times the rate found in the general population. To look at some specific numbers, there are 2.2 million people in jail (or prison) in the country. So just over 21,000 of those people have HIV or AIDS.
Black men and women are disproportionately more likely to live with HIV or AIDS while inside prison. The rate of transmission in prison is actually quite low; most people who live with the virus while inside prison entered with it in their system. Which points to these alleged medication failings as symptoms of systemic racism as well.
A November investigation found that the Fulton County Jail blocked the use of 1,000 rapid HIV testing kits.
Fulton County Commission just renewed its $21 million contract with NaphCare, the company that provides health care to correctional facilities in 25 states, including Georgia. Including this jail.