Epidemics and Covid-19 in African Prisons: towards an Inclusive Approach of Health

International audienceTranslation of : « Épidémies et Covid-19 dans les prisons africaines : l’occasion d’une approche de la santé vraiment globale », Santé Publique, 2021, vol. 32, nᵒ 5, pp. 583‑587, doi:10.3917/spub.205.0583"The Covid-19 pandemic is an opportunity to consider how healthcare among African prisons continues to be a neglected factor in the region’s prison system. In addition to the particular difficulties that the virus poses in detention centers, healthcare management in prisons represents additional challenges. Prison infirmaries, even when available, rarely comply with global health standards. Prison administrations provide little support and care for prisoners and their basic needs. Nutritional deficiencies, as well as chronic skin diseases, are frequent, and the incarcerated population depends largely on their families’ financial provision or on NGOs’ to be able to access medical care. Two arguments are typically used by official actors to justify the implementation of what resembles a necropolitics in prison: (i) The social illegitimacy of the prison population, and (ii) States’ aversion to provide services for prisoners when they cannot secure those same services for the rest of the population. Additionally, international actors intervening in prisons mainly focus on epidemic pathologies, as their funding comes from institutions such as UNAIDS or world funds supporting global health politics and strategies. Beyond the recognition of individual medical experiences and epidemic concern, approaching healthcare in prisons as a global priority reaffirms the dignity and rights of imprisoned individuals, which is a necessary condition to maintaining citizenship rights even within prison. It is thus necessary to further examine the reasons behind the lagging provision of healthcare services in African prisons and develop an argument for a global approach that prioritizes this issue.