Hepatitis Among Inmates

Hepatitis B vaccine is increasingly available to correctional inmates and
staff, and thus this infection, which is transmitted by the same routes as
HIV, can and should be brought under better control in correctional
facilities. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA)
requires that correctional staff who have direct contact with inmates be
offered hepatitis B vaccination.

By contrast, there is not yet a vaccine or proven effective treatment for
hepatitis C, and this disease is an increasingly serious problem, particularly
among injection-drug users (IDUs) and persons infected with HIV.[1]  In a
1994 blinded study, 41 percent of incoming California inmates (39 percent
of men and 55 percent of women) were antibody positive for hepatitis C
virus (HCV). In the same study, 61 percent of HIV-seropositive men and
85 percent of HIV-seropositive women were also HCV positive.[2] A
study of female entrants to the Connecticut prison system found adjusted
odds ratios for HCV infection of 10 and 7, respectively, among
HIV-positive women and IDU women. More than 70 percent of IDU
women in the study were HCV positive, and 36 percent of sexual partners
of IDUs were HCV positive.[3] A voluntary study of 192 inmates at a
medium-security facility in Springhill, Nova Scotia, found that 28 percent
were HCV positive, but the rates were sharply higher among IDUs (52
percent) than among non-IDUs (3 percent).[4]  A pilot study of 108
incoming male and female inmates at the Hampden County,
Massachusetts, Correctional Center (Springfield area) in 1998 found that
22 percent were infected with HCV.[5]