Jailcare: Finding The Safety Net For Women Behind Bars

FEATURING CAROLYN SUFRIN – Democratic Senators Cory Booker of New Jersey and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts in early July 2017 introduced a bill in Congress to improve the treatment of female inmates, including ending the practice of shackling pregnant women while they give birth. The Dignity for Incarcerated Women Act addresses the fastest growing prison population in the US – women.

Pregnant women in particular face harsh conditions during their incarceration. But ironically, conditions in the nation as a whole are so severe that some women actually get better medical care within prisons than before their incarceration.

Carolyn Sufrin, medical anthropologist and an obstetrician-gynecologist at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. She is the author of Jailcare: Finding The Safety Net For Women Behind Bars.