Link: Jail’s contagious dispute | Philadelphia Inquirer | 11/23/2007.
At the Gloucester County Jail, MRSA spread among inmates to corrections officers and beyond: Several spouses of inmates and corrections officers were infected. No one has died, but the infections have left many of the victims with lifelong medical complications, produced 18 lawsuits, and raised questions about the jail’s response.
The federal lawsuits have already cost tens of thousands of dollars to defend, and there is a local precedent for substantial jury awards and payments to plaintiffs. The Bucks County Jail was the subject of 19 MRSA-related lawsuits. Two years ago a jury awarded $800,000 and $400,000 to two inmates, and $150,000 settlements were reached with others. A lawsuit to improve conditions at the jail, filed on behalf of 36 other inmates, is pending.
Corrections facilities are especially vulnerable to MRSA because the germ spreads in close quarters and thrives in unsanitary settings. Aside from the cases in Bucks County, MRSA outbreaks have taken place in other county jails in the region and in Philadelphia. The Pennsylvania Institutional Law Project, a rights advocate for inmates, estimates that as many as 30 people infected with MRSA in city prisons have received undisclosed settlements.
The Gloucester County Jail, home to about 300 men awaiting trial or serving sentences of less than one year, became a kind of incubator for MRSA in 2003, according to the lawsuits and interviews with inmates, corrections officers and others.
The lawsuits allege that county officials withheld or "fraudulently concealed" information about the spread of MRSA and failed to "put procedures or policies in place to eliminate or minimize the risk of exposure." County officials deny the allegations and say they responded aggressively as soon as they learned MRSA was spreading.
