For Immediate Release
Media Contact:
Justin Burke - 213.201.1525
GOVERNOR DEALS MAJOR BLOW TO HIV PREVENTION IN CALIFORNIA PRISONS
Bill to Allow Condom Distribution Vetoed
Los Angeles, Calif., September 29, 2006 – AIDS Project Los Angeles (APLA) today expressed bitter disappointment with Governor Schwarzenegger’s veto of AB 1677, which would have allowed the distribution of condoms in state prisons.
Authored by Assemblymember Paul Koretz (D-West Hollywood) and co-sponsored by APLA, AIDS Healthcare Foundation, and the Southern California HIV Advocacy Coalition, the bill would have allowed non-profit or public health care agencies to make condoms available in state prisons, at no cost to California.
According to the National Institute of Justice, HIV infection rates in California’s prison system are eight to 10 times higher than in the general population. In addition to injection drug use and tattooing, unprotected sex between inmates is a primary mode of HIV transmission in prisons, despite prohibitions against sexual relations. The Federal Bureau of Prisons has estimated that up to 30 percent of federal inmates engage in same sex activity behind bars.
“Over the last 20 years, we have reduced the number of HIV infections in this country by 75 percent,” said APLA Executive Director Craig. E. Thompson. “We need to build on past successes to reach people at risk. Instead, political pressure, resistance to change and denial of the reality of sex in prisons have converged to block access to a basic HIV prevention tool. Prisoners remain at high risk for HIV transmission, and we have failed them.”
A 2006 study of California prisons by the Public Policy Institute of California found that three of every four male prisoners in California are nonwhite; 38 percent are Latino and 29 percent are African American. However, adult African American men are seven times as likely as white men, and 4.5 times as likely as Latino men, to be incarcerated in California. The overall prison population has grown by 73 percent in the last 15 years.
With the average length of stay in prison just over two years, inmates can potentially spread HIV infection to their sexual partners upon release back into their communities.
“The governor has missed a major opportunity to protect our communities inside and outside of California prisons,” Thompson said.
According to a 2005 survey by the California Department of Health Services, nearly 70 percent of Californians believe that condom availability in state prisons is a sensible health policy.
Other states, including Vermont and the jail systems of New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Washington, D.C., permit condom distribution. No correctional system that instituted a policy of distributing condoms has ever reversed the policy, suggesting that the concerns that condoms would be used as weapons or as means to carry contraband have not materialized.
Recently, a bill that would allow condom distribution in federal correction facilities was introduced by Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-Calif.).
The average annual cost of treatment for a person living with AIDS on Medi-Cal in 2002-2003 was nearly $23,000. Many HIV-positive inmates will likely end up relying on public programs like Medi-Cal and the AIDS Drug Assistance Program for care and access to drugs.
“A governor who saw through arguments against non-prescription needle sales should have seen through the case against condoms in prisons,” Thompson said. “Instead, we’re looking at bigger costs, in lives and dollars, down the road.”
AIDS Project Los Angeles, one of the largest non-profit AIDS service organizations in the United States, provides bilingual direct services, prevention education and leadership on HIV/AIDS-related policy and legislation. Founded by four friends in 1982, APLA is a community-based, volunteer-supported organization with local, national and global reach. For more information, visit www.apla.org.
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