The Ghana Prison Service, in the midst of the Coronavirus have revealed measures put in place to ensure prisoners keep safe in these times.
Speaking to GhanaWeb, the Public Relations Officer for the Ghana Prison Service, Superintendent Courage Atsem stated that new admissions are screened and go through the 14-day mandatory isolation period before they join other inmates.
“We have all new admissions screened for COVID-19 and thereafter quarantined for 14 days. That has been the practice, for now, it has been challenging because of the prisons are congested therefore finding the space for isolation was a bit of a challenge,” he said.
Supt. Atsem said the prison service have created seven new prison facilities across the country to admit new inmates.
“The prison administration in conjunction with other players in the Criminal Justice System has come out with seven selected prisons purposely for new admissions, by this arrangement we might be minimizing the risk of transmitting the virus to a larger number of inmates,” he stated.
On the issue of overcrowding in Ghana’s prisons, Supt. Atsem told GhanaWeb, “pardon is one of the ways to decongest prisons. It is the prerogative of the president, so anytime he decides to do it, it will be a welcome development. There are other measures too except that those are rather for medium to long-term purposes.”
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