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| Inmates say AIDS education is lacking |
| By Contra Costa Times |
| Published: 08/30/2004 |
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Darrell Garrett remembers many things about the 21/2 years he spent in several California prisons. The 41-year-old can tell you about cafeteria brawls and selling cigarettes at San Quentin. He can tell you the exact size of his cell at Vacaville. He can tell you about men finding places to have sex where officers couldn't see. He can't tell you what caused him to develop AIDS several years ago. "I used to shoot dope, but I always kept my own needle," said Garrett, an El Cerrito resident. "I had a lot of women back in the day, too. I really just don't know." What parolees don't know or won't say about their HIV or AIDS status, or how they deal with the illness after they return home has become a concern of health educators. State prison officials say 1,163 HIV-positive men currently live in state prisons. Because prisons don't routinely test inmates, the number of infected parolees likely is higher. Community health workers say an unknown number of parolees return to the East Bay often ill-educated, impoverished and uninformed. "People just don't understand how the virus can spread so easily," said community health worker Sandy Johnson. HIV rates in minority women have increased in Pittsburg because some are the spouses of parolees who don't know they're infected, she said. Health educators with the Pittsburg Pre-School and Community Council Inc. talked to 113 high-risk women from July 2003 to June of this year and found 60 percent had had sexual relationships or shared needles with a partner who had been in prison or jail. Also, 20 of 28 HIV-positive women with whom the council works said they had sex with men who have been behind bars. The stigma of AIDS traps men and women in silence. Health educators at the council asked several women to speak to the Times, but they declined for fear of revealing their status to family members. Not telling family and friends about their disease is similar to being behind bars, some parolees said. Inmates could deal with their ailments earlier, and learn how to take care of themselves and others before their release, Johnson said. "You can educate them all you want, but there will always be men having sex in prison or doing things that could cause infection." The silence extends to the prisons themselves. The prisons isolate known HIV/AIDS inmates. But the most basic protective device -- the condom -- is illegal, as are inmate sexual relations. Sen. Gloria Romero, D-Los Angeles, said at some point the Department of Corrections will have to reevaluate its policy on condoms. "The CDC can't look the other way because the reality is sex happens in prisons," Romero said. State institutions deal with structure and control, and the mentality of officers does not support a nurturing environment, said Christine Leivermann, director of the HIV/AIDS program at Contra Costa Health Services. Former prisoners say inmates have sex all the time without protection, whether it is consensual or forced. Drugs are also illegal, but smugglers get small amounts of intravenous drugs and needles to inmates, who use each other's drug tools. The Corrections Department investigates sexual assaults, but it declined to reveal the number of cases reported last year. |
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