Happy Memorial Day! Compassionate Release Decisions Have not Always "Followed the Science" On Effectiveness and Adverse Side-Effects of Vaccines, Seriousness of Long COVID.
by Derek Gilna, Director of Research
Thank you,
veterans ! It has been almost six months since DOJ was REQUIRED by law to award
and post the one-year sentence credits for programming and employment.
Congress, in the First Step Act,
unequivocally spelled out this deadline,
but prison system has only awarded credits to those who were within one year of
release to avoid legal liability for confining individuals whose sentences were
completed. Instead of promptly complying with the law, prison officials have
blamed
Even those
not close to release date but close to their 50% mark have a liberty interest
in becoming CARES eligible before the program
goes away at some point in the indeterminate future. Your case managers and
counselors, and even your wardens have NO say in this matter, and there is no
point in calling
Congressional pressure to move the EQUAL Act to a vote has increased in the past week, as Republicans and Democrats who are not in leadership have begun to speak out on this necessary legislation, which overwhelmingly passed the House. Senate Majority Leader Schumer, who is desperately attempting to avoid a primary challenger from progressive superstar Ocasio-Cortez, is feeling the heat from among others, Corey Booker, who is a reliable supporter of justice reform. My feeling that this should come to a vote before the election, but certainly shortly thereafter.
To no one's surprise, the newest virus, known as Monkey pox, is spreading in federal prisons. Unlike Omicron, the symptoms of this cannot be passed off as simple flu, as it also produces large fluid-filled blisters along with flu symptoms.
Human-to-human transmission of the virus is known to occur, but is less common. The virus isn’t especially infectious between humans as it requires very close contact to spread, (like in prisons?) and people are only contagious when they have symptoms, Dr. Whitworth said. Still, it could spread within a close-knit community, he added. Symptoms of Monkey pox include fever, headache, muscle aches, chills and exhaustion. A chicken pox-like rash can develop, beginning on the face then spreading to other parts of the body, such as the hands and feet. The rash eventually forms scabs, which later fall off. Most people recover after a week or two although the disease can be deadly. Vaccines have not been found to protect from this virus. https://www.wsj.com/articles/monkeypox-outbreak-widens-in-europe-11652901073.
" We have been on lockdown for supposed to be covid 19 protocol ..... lies, lies, and more lies .......... the 8th case of monkey pox is here @ bennettsville........ they are trying to hide it as not to scare the general public but its real and factual."
COVID and
its variants continue to infest numerous prisons, including Waseca,
Prison watchdogs are gathering information as Congressional critics of the federal prison system sharpen their pencils for the next oversight hearings, which will focus on the near total breakdown of the prison medical system. Despite years of understating medical problems, as well as systematically altering medical records to downplay deteriorating prisoner health, the system's the wheels are almost ready to fall off. Years of headline -grabbing drug "taskforces," entrapment of non-contact SO's, and questionable long sentences given to non-violent offenders, all used to grab more dollars from a gullible public and a nervous Congress, have all contributed to this mess.
Where has all the money appropriated for medical care gone? Certainly not to Carswell, where elderly and chronically and terminally ill women languish in beds when they could be home with their families. Hundreds of women are treated by two doctors and one gynecologist. Routine tests of people with terminal heart disease and cancer-like symptoms are either delayed or not carried out. All the impressive program statements in the world mean nothing if they are not followed.
In March 2022, the Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General (OIG) issued a report on audits of three medical service contracts for over $300 million “Although (DOJ) told us that it did not identify any significant problems with ...performance related to the timely delivery of inmate healthcare and quality of care (Huh?), we found that it did not have a reliable, consistent process in place to evaluate either the timeliness of inmate healthcare or the quality of that care," and "faced challenges in transporting inmates to off-site appointments which resulted in a frequent need to reschedule appointments that could delay an inmate’s healthcare," and did not, "have systems in place to track and monitor the causes for rescheduling appointments," or "a process in place to monitor how long an inmate waited to receive care after a cancelled appointment...we believe it is difficult for the (prisons) to determine whether inmates are receiving care within the required community standard.” These are all issues that a first year MBA student could solve. https://oig.justice.org/sites/default/files/reports/22-052.pdf.
Also in the same report: " One institution has been without a pharmacist for most of 2022 due to being out on medical leave. The result according to the submission to OIG is that “We now have several psychiatric patients decompensating daily. We also have many diabetics, hypertensives, cardiomyopathy and HIV inmates that have run out of medications and have no way of refilling them until they, as well as emergent issues, or are lucky enough to communicate the need to executive staff, or custody staff who communicate it to Medical...we have more than 750 unfilled prescriptions."
We have received numerous inquiries to provide official data on the effectiveness of COVID vaccines. A new study has concluded that while vaccinated people who get breakthrough COVID-19 infections are less likely to become severely ill or die, they still can develop the serious, lingering problems known as Long-COVID. “The constellation of findings shows that the burden of death and disease experienced by people with [breakthrough infections] is not trivial,” say the authors of the study published this week in Nature Medicine. In general, it found that, six months after infection, a significant number experienced serious problems affecting areas such as the heart, lungs, kidneys, mental health and brain function. Vaccinated people were less likely to come down with long-term lung problems and blood clots, but their rates for the other problems were similar to those of unvaccinated people who got COVID-19. Ziyad Al-Aly, the lead author and a researcher at VA Saint Louis Health Care System, called the findings “disappointing. I was hoping to see that vaccines offer more protection, especially given that vaccines are our only line of defense nowadays,” he said.
The authors also compared the long-term problems experienced by people hospitalized with breakthrough COVID-19 with those of people hospitalized with regular flu, finding the COVID-19 patients were more likely to have long-term problems.
The authors said the findings shed light on the previously murky question of whether vaccinated people who get breakthrough infections can end up with long-COVID.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-022-01840-0.
The underreported
nationwide toll of adverse reactions to COVID vaccinations continues to mount,
with the number reaching 820,787 (US), through
