LOS ANGELES – The number of COVID-19 cases has exploded in one of California’s oldest prisons, San Quentin, as more than 1,000 inmates have tested positive for the virus, authorities in the US state announced Tuesday.
Governor Gavin Newsom said San Quentin is their deep area of focus and concern right now, noting that 42 percent of the some 3,500 inmates here are considered “medically vulnerable.”
Unlike other penitentiaries in California, San Quentin State Prison had largely been spared the ravages of coronavirus until the beginning of June. But the transfer of inmates from prisons gravely affected by the virus, such as the California Institution for Men in Chino, opened the floodgates.
The detention center in Chino was a known COVID-19 hotspot since the start of the pandemic.
San Quentin prison currently makes up half of the recorded cases of COVID-19 in prisons throughout California, which has a total incarcerated population of about 113,000 people.
In an attempt to avoid an abnormally high mortality rate among inmates, state authorities have decided to free some detainees.
Newsom announced Monday that another 3,500 potential candidates had been identified for freedom, 110 of whom are at San Quentin. (AFP)
