Toxic Prisons and Their Risks When Combined with COVID-19

Author: Joyleen Mabika

Environmental injustices of mass incarceration and how they impact risks for severe/fatal COVID-19 illness.

Photo of Alcatraz Island Ferry Terminal by Carles Rabada on Unsplash

Overview

More than 2.3 million Americans are currently being held in over 6,000 prisons, jails, and detention centers across the United States. Over 600 federal and state prisons are located within three miles of a Superfund site, and over 100 are located within one mile. Superfund sites are contaminated locations in the Unites States which require a long-term response to clean up hazardous material. Correctional institutions must consider environmental justice in order to protect their inmates, employees, and community members living in surrounding areas. Incarcerated people are infected by COVID-19 at a rate 5.5 times higher than the US population, with a death rate 3.0 times higher.

On this page, we will review multiple sources to understand how environmentally toxic living conditions put prisoners at greater risk of severe COVID-19 illness.

J. Mabika - Toxic Prisons.mp3

Audio (2:42m)

Audio Summary Transcript

When I ask you to think about American prisons during COVID-19, what comes to mind? … Was it environmental justice? It is likely that for many of us, that was not the case. Right now, there are over 2.3 million Americans being held in over 6,000 prisons, jails, and detention centers across the United States. Over one third of all federal and state prisons are located within three miles of a superfund site. Superfund sites contain so much toxic material that they require a long-term response for clean-up. These sites are so hazardous that they endanger the health inmates, prison workers, and members of neighboring communities.

You see, it’s all about the amount of toxic stressors you are exposed to that make you vulnerable. Briefly put yourself in the position of an inmate at ADX Florence, where toxins like uranium, selenium, and sulfate have seeped deep into the groundwater and contaminated wells. You also deal with occasional radioactive wind gusts because the prison lies in the direct wind path of a neighboring superfund site. Your immune system is already compromised. And then you catch COVID-19 which exploits your weakened immune system and makes you experience severe illness, maybe even death.

In this scenario, was COVID-19 to blame? Absolutely, but to leave it at that would be a gross misunderstanding of what happened. The multitude of environmental toxins wore down your body’s defenses leaving you unprotected when the COVID-19 virus attacked. This exact scenario can be applied to previous epidemics, our current pandemic, and the next one. Kostoff et al asserted that toxicology must be considered in addition to virology in order to effectively address, prevent, and treat COVID-19. In order to do this, we need to protect immune systems by intrinsically reducing the amount of stressors that people living and working in and around these toxic sites are exposed to. It is also just as important to hold the people producing these toxins accountable for their impact on human health!

As you browse this webpage, I urge you to reflect on the reality of the scenario previously mentioned, as well as how different the outcome might have been without the presence of toxins.

Sheep Knob, West Virginia. Photo by Kent Kessinger, courtesy of Appalachian Voices

“When trees have been cut down…and everything has been contaminated and poisoned in the process, the final solution is, okay now we’re going to build a prison here.”

-Paul Wright, executive director of the Human Rights Defense Center

Toxic Exposures

Coal Ash

Coal ash contains arsenic, chromium, lead, mercury, cadmium, and thallium.
State Correctional Institution (SCI) Fayette in Pennsylvania was built on a former coal mine which left over 40 million tons of coal waste (Reutter, 2015). The facility also sits adjacent to a 506-acre coal ash dump. In 2014, SCI Fayette sent surveys to prisoners and found that 81% of respondents reported respiratory, throat and sinus conditions, 69% reported gastrointestinal problems, and 59% reported rashes, hives, cysts and abscesses, and 12% reported thyroid problems. Prison employees have experienced a high rate of breast, kidney, and thyroid cancer (Reutter, 2015).

Mountaintop Removal Sites

Mountaintop removal is a practice that does exactly what the name suggests; it removes up to 800 feet off the tops of mountains for the mining of coal and other minerals. Michael Hendryx, a researcher at Indiana University provided evidence that the leading increase in disease and death in Appalachia was linked to the widespread mining practice of mountaintop removal. This process is also associated with a wide range of illnesses, including “cardiovascular disease, lung cancer, pulmonary disease, and birth defects” (Schiffman, 2017.)
His research has found that “[t]he number of excess deaths every year comes to about 1,200 people who live in these mining communities compared to other parts of Appalachia” with the health impacts becoming more pronounced as the levels of mining go up. What makes MTR sites so dangerous is that these particles being released are mostly in the ultra-fine range. This means that they can penetrate deeply into the vascular system and lung tissue, and go anywhere in the body. Some particulates in the air near MTR sites are aluminium, tin, iron, and high levels of silica, a known lung carcinogen (Schiffman, 2017).
Eastern Kentucky’s hills showcase the aftermath of mountaintop removal mining. These hills are also home to four federal prisons. There were plans to build a fifth prison worth $510 million in Letcher County on an abandoned MTR site, but inmates and activists managed to halt the process (Moattar, 2019).

Contaminated Drinking Water

Velsicol Chemical Corporation, formerly known as Michigan Chemical Corporation, produced more than 200 chemicals, including DDT and PBB, from 1936-1978. These chemicals were dumped by the tons into the Pine River, and the company at fault was released of any liabilities after paying $38.5 million. In 2006, St. Louis found pCBSA, a byproduct of the manufacturing of DDT, in their water supply. Because of this, the more than 3500 prisoners incarcerated at Central Michigan and Pine River Correctional Facilities have no other option but to consume the contaminated water (Bradshaw, 2018).
Since 2000, eight of California’s 33 state prisons have been cited for major water pollution problems (Dannenberg, 2007). This report by Dannenberg also noted countless instances of contaminated drinking water in US prisons nationwide.
ADX Florence is located 6.3 miles southeast of the Cotter Uranium Processing Facility, a uranium mine. Waste from the mine seeped into the groundwater and contaminated local wells. Contaminants included molybdenum, uranium, uranium daughter products (radium, radon gas, and polonium), selenium, and sulfate (Cepero, 2015).
Additionally, ADX Florence is directly in Cotter’s wind pattern, so the facility’s inhabitants must deal with radioactive wind gusts of radium, uranium, and thorium.

Adding in COVID-19

Now that we have established an understanding of the wide variety of environmental toxins that prisoners are exposed to, we will explore what that means during our current COVID-19 pandemic.

This section will be heavily based on the work of Kostoff et al., (2020) who assert that toxicology must be considered in addition to virology in order to effectively address, prevent, and treat COVID-19. I suggest that these considerations are especially true for the large population of vulnerable Americans who are incarcerated in toxic prisons.

Virus-Toxic Stressors Combination Nexus

(or, how the virus works with toxic exposures/stressors.)

Toxic exposures weaken the immune system, which is central to infectious disease resistance. COVID-19 exploits the already weakened immune system, leading to an increased risk of death or severe illness in prisoners sick with the virus.

How it works

Assume arbitrarily that COVID-19 (C4) and three other toxic stressors (C1, C2, and C3) were required to bring about a lethal case of pneumonia. Also assume that any combination of three of the stressors did not result in any symptoms. Finally, assume that each experiment began with three of the stressors present, adding the fourth and resulting in fatal pneumonia.

In mixture A, one would conclude that it was the virus that caused the illness. In mixture B, one would conclude it was exposure to pesticides that caused it. In mixture C it would be a high fat diet as the culprit, and in mixture D it would be wireless radiation. In the words of Kostoff et al.,"[t]his procedure would be repeated for all four elements, and show that if one chose to select a single element for cause of death, it could be any of the four based on the marginal impact" (2020). The authors also explained that by choosing to assign a single element as the cause of illness, stakeholders are not held accountable for the deaths that occur. This approach has been taken solely for financial and political purposes, not for scientific reasons.

An "Arbitrary attribution of death for multi-component mixture" from Kostoff et al. (2020).

When combined together

The series of toxic exposure combinations (including COVID-19 as a component) is what Kostoff et al. describes as the “virus-toxic stressors combination nexus” (2020). Once the threshold of toxic stressors has been achieved we consider a person to be “vulnerable,” meaning that they are more likely to experience severe or fatal symptoms if they catch the COVID-19 virus. For the millions of Americans incarcerated in toxic prisons and likely to contract COVID-19, we cannot only hold Mother Nature responsible. We must actively work to protect them from these environmental hazards to reduce their risk during this pandemic as well as the next one.

What can be done?

Photo by Ryk Porras on Unsplash

Intrinsically Strengthen the Immune System

It is common knowledge that having a chronic illness will make you more susceptible to severe COVID-19. Less commonly known is that your environment is the greatest contributor to chronic illness, even more than genetics (Sears and Genius, 2012). In order to reduce the risk of severe/fatal COVID-19 illness we must strengthen the immune systems of inmates and prison workers in the following ways:

Identify the toxic stressors to which they are exposed.
Remove the stressor.
Replace it with immune-strengthening factors.

Photo by Dan Meyers on Unsplash

Hold Stakeholders Accountable

The health risks associated with living near a superfund site have been well-established in scholarly literature. However, we continue to leave the burden of protection from these intoxicants to individual members of the public. Incarcerated Americans have no control over their environment and are forced to be exposed to these toxic stressors as long as they are serving their time.

Incarcerated Americans are not considered in the EPA's environmental justice policies, and are too often overlooked by environmental justice movements. The Human Rights Defense Center found "no information pointing to any intention of the EPA to recognize the population of people in prison, despite the fact that they constitute the most vulnerable and overburdened demographic of citizens in the country" (Wright, 2015).

Below I've included organizations committed to holding the EPA, prison industrial complex, and industries producing the toxic waste accountable for endangering human life.

Photo by Prison Ecology, courtesy of Nation Inside

Prison Ecology Project

The mission of the Prison Ecology Project is to map where environmental degradation and mass incarceration intersect, and then create action plans to address the multitude of problems that lie therein. Their website includes ongoing research, points of action, stories, and recent news surrounding this topic.

Fight Toxic Prisons

At the intersection of the abolitionist movement against mass incarceration and the environmental justice movement is the Campaign to Fight Toxic Prisons (FTP). In collaboration the Abolitionist Law Center, FTP is committed to “grassroots organizing, advocacy, and direct action to challenge the prison system which is putting prisoners at risk of dangerous environmental conditions, as well as impacting surrounding communities and ecosystems by their construction and operation”

Photo by Fight Toxic Prisons

References

Bradshaw, E. A. (2018, July 12). Tombstone Towns and Toxic Prisons: Prison Ecology and the Necessity of an Anti-prison Environmental Movement. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1007/s10612-018-9399-6

Cepero, L. (2015, September 10). Toxic Traps: Environmental Hazards Threaten Two Federal Supermax Prisons. Retrieved from https://solitarywatch.org/2015/09/10/toxic-traps-environmental-hazards-threaten-two-federal-supermax-prisons/

Dannenberg, J. E. (2007, November). Prison Drinking Water and Wastewater Pollution Threaten Environmental Safety Nationwide. Retrieved from https://www.prisonlegalnews.org/news/2007/nov/15/prison-drinking-water-and-wastewater-pollution-threaten-environmental-safety-nationwide/

Kostoff, R.N., Briggs, M.B., Porter, A.L., Aschner, M., Spandidos, D.A., & Tsatsakis, A. (2020). [Editorial] COVID‑19: Post‑lockdown guidelines. International Journal of Molecular Medicine, 46, 463-466. https://doi.org/10.3892/ijmm.2020.4640

Kostoff, R. N., Briggs, M. B., Porter, A. L., Hernández, A. F., Abdollahi, M., Aschner, M., & Tsatsakis, A. (2020, November). The under-reported role of toxic substance exposures in the COVID-19 pandemic. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fct.2020.111687

Moattar, D. (2019, June 19). US scraps prison plan for abandoned coal mine. Retrieved from https://p.dw.com/p/3KgS8

Reutter, D. (2015, April 9). Report Highlights Health Concerns Related to Coal Ash Dump at Pennsylvania Prison. Retrieved from https://www.prisonlegalnews.org/news/2015/apr/9/report-highlights-health-concerns-related-coal-ash-dump-pennsylvania-prison/

Schiffman, R. (2017, November 21). A Troubling Look at the Human Toll of Mountaintop Removal Mining. Retrieved from https://e360.yale.edu/features/a-troubling-look-at-the-human-toll-of-mountaintop-removal-mining

Sears, M. E., & Genuis, S. J. (2012, January 19). Environmental Determinants of Chronic Disease and Medical Approaches: Recognition, Avoidance, Supportive Therapy, and Detoxification. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1155/2012/356798

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