URGENT European action to give early release to prisoners in advanced stages of an incurable disease has been called for in a report published yesterday.
The report by International Prison Watch and a group called AIDES Provence, published in Paris, said there has been a significant increase in the number of prisoners in advanced or very advanced stages of an incurable disease, for example cancer, tuberculosis and particularly AIDS.
The report stressed these prisoners should not die in prison. It also pointed out that prison overcrowding, space restrictions, the break up of family life and hygiene conditions in prisons were factors contributing to the worsening of illness.
The procedures for releasing an ill prisoner were time consuming, complicated and fraught with uncertainty. Most of these prisoners die in prison.
Mr Joe Costello, the Labour TD who has worked for the welfare of prisoners, said Irish prisoners who were seriously ill were generally released early on compassionate grounds. It would be exceptional for a terminally ill patient to die in an Irish prison.
The report expressed concern that legal systems in Europe did not appear to take into account this inequality before punishment. There should be a new law conforming to universal rights.
The report shows the rate of HIV infection in southern European countries is high 26 per cent in Spain, of whom 40 per cent have tuberculosis, and 17 per cent in Italy.
In northern Europe the rates are lower 4.5 per cent in Scotland, for example. In France, the average national rate of HIV infection for the prison population is 2.3 per cent (June 1995), or nearly 10 times as high as that in the general population.