The American Friends Service Committee-Arizona, a Quaker group critical of the way Arizona prison inmates are treated, turned up the heat Wednesday on the Department of Corrections by renewing claims that the state delays and denies medical care to prisoners.
Caroline Isaacs, the group’s program director, said at a late-morning news conference just outside DOC headquarters in Phoenix that the state fails to provide medication and medical devices to inmates, allows low staffing levels by a private contractor and has insufficient mental-health treatment for those in its charge.
She cited her group’s calculation that there have been 50 deaths, including eight suicides, within the prison system during the first eight months of this calendar year, as an example of how the DOC is not providing proper health care.
“Anyone would agree that 50 deaths is 50 too many,” Isaacs said in an interview.
Doug Nick, a DOC spokesman, said his office would not comment because of an ongoing legal battle with the American Civil Liberties Union, which claims in a class-action lawsuit now before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that prisoners receive inadequate care.
DOC records show the number of prisoner deaths has declined since hitting 100 fatalities in fiscal 2008.
In fiscal 2013, which ended June 30, there were 83 deaths, seven of them suicides, in the system of roughly 40,000 inmates. This fiscal year, 33 inmates have died, four by suicide, DOC officials said.
The number of deaths calculated by Isaacs and the DOC, respectively, do not match because Isaacs used calendar- year data, while the state reports data by fiscal year.
Isaacs released a 33-page report that included case studies of inmates the group claims suffered from poor care. The report criticized Arizona’s hiring of private medical firms to provide inmate health care.
Wexford Health Sources Inc. and the DOC agreed earlier this year to terminate Wexford’s medical-services contract in the wake of accusations that the company improperly dispensed medicine to inmates and wasted state resources.
To replace Wexford, the state signed a more expensive contract making Corizon Inc. of Brentwood, Tenn., the health-care provider at all Arizona-run prisons.
Corizon, the country’s largest provider of correctional medical care, took over March 4.
Corizon, in a statement, said that it has increased the skill level of a number of health-care staff members since taking over and that its goal is to continually improve patient outcomes.
Isaacs’ group also called on the Arizona auditor general to investigate DOC inmate care and for the Arizona Legislature to end the requirement for privatized medical care in state prisons.
Jay Zsorey, the auditor general’s financial-audit director, said his agency has not received a formal request from the American Friends Service Committee.
However, he said the office typically does not respond to public groups because the auditor general works for the Legislature, though it has given guidance following formal requests from state agencies.
The Republican-controlled Legislature and Gov. Jan Brewer have been advocates of private firms operating within the state prison system.
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