Abolition for the People

Prisons Are a Public Health Crisis — and the Cure Is Right in Front of Us

The best way to curb pandemics like Covid-19 is to abolish the conditions that breed their spread

This article is part of Abolition for the People, a series brought to you by a partnership between Kaepernick Publishing and LEVEL, a Medium publication for and about the lives of Black and Brown men. The series, which comprises 30 essays and conversations over four weeks, points to the crucial conclusion that policing and prisons are not solutions for the issues and people the state deems social problems — and calls for a future that puts justice and the needs of the community first.

As we deal with the scourge of Covid-19, which has killed more than 210,000 people and rising, policy and public health experts are clamoring for strategies to stop the spread of the virus, in absence of credible and competent leadership at the federal level. Most of what works (without a vaccine or highly effective treatment that reduces transmission to others), is known — if unevenly practiced or implemented.

There is inspiring work happening in the U.S. and globally around how to reduce transmission of Covid-19 (or any future airborne pathogens) in settings…