For days, in different parts of Spain, vans and large cars have begun to go to different prisons in Spain. Medical personnel travel in them whose mission is to vaccinate the prison population. What has scandalized the prison unions —Among them, Your Abandonment Can Kill Me — is that the dose of the Janssen to all the prisoners, one by one, module by module, regardless of the age limit. Any convicted or preventive inmate, be they 18, 25 or 32 years old, is already receiving their dose, well ahead of the rate of the general population. Penitentiary Institutions recognizes that the prisons of the Basque Country, Cantabria, Córdoba, Huelva, Arrecife and Seville, for example, already have all inmates vaccinated. Others such as Lanzarote, Murcia and León have already started vaccination, but have not finished yet, so they will continue in the coming days.
When asked the reason why inmates are being prioritized above the rest of the population, from Penitentiary Institutions refer to the text ‘Vaccination strategy against covid-19 in Spain‘(update 5). In this document from the Interterritorial Health Council, you can read on page 11: “The prison population groups together people of all ages and with risky conditions. For reasons for feasibility and access to the centers where they are found, and taking into account the greater risk of exposure and the principle of need and protection against vulnerability, it is recommended to group and simplify vaccination activities in this population, taking into account the circumstances of each center. The vaccination of this group will begin at the time that is considered most appropriate, but coinciding, at least, with group 8 and taking into account the characteristics of the population of each penitentiary center ”.
Today @healthy is vaccinating the more than 1,000 inmates of the Huelva Penitentiary Center.
They will also vaccinate workers who were pending from the previous campaign.
As always, the toilets of @IIPPGob on the front line collaborating with @healthy ???? pic.twitter.com/hgIyawcyHe
– Penitentiary Institutions (@IIPPGob) May 5, 2021
What is group 8? Are the people between 56 and 65 years old, born between 1956 and 1965, both years inclusive. The plan establishes: “It will begin by vaccinating people born in 1956 with AstraZeneca, advancing in the year of birth, according to the availability of the dose ”. However, in Andalusia, it is currently being vaccinated with the first dose to the population over 68 years old, that is, we would still be in group 5C (people between 66 and 69 years of age), and in Cantabria to the population over 70 years old, so the Government would be giving preference to inmates over its normal population.
From some prison union, it is recalled that prisoners such as, for example, Bernardo montoya, 52 years old, alleged murderer of Laura Luelmo, who is locked up awaiting trial in the Sevilla II Penitentiary Center, have already received their vaccine, while free citizens of the same age and who have not committed any crime will still take weeks to receive their dose.
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