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It’s the end of a shift at a Lancashire jail and a prison officer is entering his house through the utility door, stripping off his clothes because of the deadly risk of coronavirus.
The officer has been working inside a prison where inmates and officers have tested positive for Covid-19. Someone at the jail has even died and the officer does not want to take unnecessary risks with the safety of his family.
The dangers of doing his job are currently so high that he has not seen his children since the pandemic began because of the risks of infection.
“When we’re at work, staff just get on with it,” he said. “We stand there – we chat to each other. It’s kind of like we’re all in the same household because we’re doing the shifts together. It’s kind of fine when you’re in work.
“But it’s coming home. I come in, take everything off and it’s straight into the washing machine on a 60 degree wash and then straight up for a shower before I even go near my wife or my dog or anything like that.
“It’d be good if we had the facilities at work to have a quick shower and get changed before we came home, but there just aren’t those facilities unfortunately.”
The prison service, like the NHS and the care sector, has seen its workforce continue to risk contact with Covid-19 daily in order to keep the sector running.
“Staff are still getting cross-deployed to different wings, so potentially not containing the virus that way”
It is essential work as defined by the government, but the risks are real.
So far, official figures as of May 6 show 447 prison staff across 66 jails have tested positive for Covid-19, as well as another 15 prisoner escort and custody service staff.
The figures are higher than the 390 prisoners who have tested positive at 74 jails nationwide, despite the relatively small size of the prison workforce compared with the inmate population.
At least five prison officers or civilian workers are known to have died during the pandemic, although there are no official government figures on these deaths.
The prison officer said he believes coronavirus is spreading rapidly within jails, although the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) says this is not the case.
Agreeing to talk to HuffPost UK on condition of anonymity, he claimed:
- Officers at his jail do not wear protective equipment such as masks and goggles as standard but only if a prisoner is showing symptoms of coronavirus.
- Prison officers are working across different wings of the jail, potentially increasing the risk of spreading the virus.
- Inmates at the jail who have Covid-19 are being held in isolation lockdown for 24 hours a day, with no showers or telephone calls.
He says he has also been made aware that a temporary morgue and critical care unit have allegedly been set up inside at least one UK jail.
“At first I was shocked at the lack of control,” said the officer, speaking about the situation in the north-west of England jail where he works. “There was not much leadership from management.
“We do have PPE now but staff are still getting cross-deployed to different wings, so potentially not containing the virus that way.
“Prisoners were getting moved around from wing to wing when they had symptoms and coming back positive, and it just didn’t seem like they’d clamped down on it enough for my liking.”
He says the situation has now improved, but adds: “There’s always more that could be done – it’s just whether it’s viable for security reasons.”
The MoJ says a “compartmentalisation” strategy to protect staff and prisoners is in place and these steps are working to limit the spread of coronavirus in jails.
The officer patrols on wings regularly, having direct contact with prisoners, and says he is surprised at how well they have adapted to Covid-19 measures.
The changes at the jail have included prisoners being held in their cells for 23 hours a day and let out for only 45 minutes to shower, exercise and make phone calls – a regime the officer says is necessary to ensure social distancing.
“To be fair the prisoners do seem to be dealing with it very well,” he said. “We thought there would be a lot of trouble, but with this new regime they seem to have just accepted it.”
Officers doing their rounds speak to prisoners about how lockdown is impacting on life outside the prison walls.
“Obviously they only get to hear what’s on the news about what’s happening outside, so when we go into work and they start complaining about something, we say to them: ‘Look, it’s actually not that good for us on the outside,’” said the officer.
“For example, I can’t see my children because I go to work. So when you explain that to the prisoners they’re kind of like: ‘Shit, it’s not that good for you either, is it?’ So they do kind of understand it.”
He also revealed prisoners have been taking part in the Thursday night clap for the NHS and other key workers.
“I was surprised to hear all the prisoners rattling the bars and cheering out the windows and everything,” he said. “Even they’ve been doing that every week and it was a shock – it was not something I expected.”
Social distancing inside jails has resulted in changes to security procedures, which has presented some challenges.
“Every prison cell used to get checked every second day to make sure there was nothing untoward in them,” said the officer.
“These are now just visual checks from the door rather than going into the cells. So some of the security measures have been lowered, hence why at first some of the prisoners were getting away with brewing their own alcohol and stuff like that in the cells.”
As in other public sectors there has been scrutiny of the amount of personal protective equipment, or PPE, available to prison officers and the availability of coronavirus testing.
“They’ve set up a temporary morgue in an old workshop of one of the jails and had delivery of body bags”
In terms of PPE, the officer says they have access to masks and gloves and there is plenty of hand sanitiser, although it took a while to get goggles.
He has been on wings holding prisoners who have tested positive for coronavirus and said PPE has to be thrown away after each cell door is opened.
Availability of testing has been a contentious issue. Public Health England has said the number of prisoners believed to have been infected with coronavirus may be up to six times as high as published figures.
While prison staff displaying symptoms of coronavirus are now eligible for testing after the government widened the criteria in recent weeks, the officer says provision earlier in the pandemic was very low.
“To start off with they were only getting a small number of tests a day and then they’d send them off and get more back,” he said. “So they were only able to test a few people.”
The MoJ said there has been an increase in staff testing, with over 1,000 referred in the past fortnight, and all prison officers are provided with PPE.
The officer said it is difficult to move symptomatic prisoners to hospital, where testing is usually carried out. They can’t go in taxis, as is usually the case for hospital transfers, and there are long waits for ambulances.
He claims there have also been shortages of medication for prisoners at the jail, including mental health medication.
Painting a blunt picture, the prison officer said preparations have been made for the death of more prisoners within jails.
“They’ve set up a temporary morgue in an old workshop of one of the jails and had delivery of body bags,” he said.
At the jail where he works, inmates with Covid-19 are being kept in isolation for seven days, which has been a key part of government policy to contain the virus in prisons.
“The prisoners that test positive now, they’re trying to keep them all on the same wing and they are basically on lockdown – they’re not allowed out at all. They don’t get showers, they don’t get phone calls,” said the officer.
“I think it’s the only way of containing it. Obviously the only way the virus has got into the jails is either by staff or visits. I personally think they waited far too long to stop domestic visits.”
Nineteen prisoners at jails across the country are known to have died, although the Ministry of Justice does not provide official death figures.
Lives have also been lost among staff in the prison service.
A guard of honour was given to 33-year-old officer Rachael Yates, who died after contracting coronavirus, by colleagues at Usk Prison in Monmouthshire last week. Her mother has called for more to be done to protect key workers.
Two staff members at HMP Pentonville in north London also died after showing symptoms of the virus, while a 48-year-old staff member at HMP Wymott died on April 8 and an unnamed Scottish prison officer died this month.
The officer says it still feels in some ways like the prison service is the forgotten service.
He says there is unease about a bonus scheme that has seen prison officers get £150-a-month extra pay due to the coronavirus pandemic, while governor grade staff reportedly get much more.
“We’ve heard that the governor grades are getting a £1,500 bonus a month and they’re being allowed to work from home so many days and not be on the front line, which has kind of peeved off a lot of the staff,” he said.
Despite this, people are just getting on with their jobs, the prison officer said.
“It’s just a tough time for everyone, isn’t it?” he said. “We’re kind of used to being the forgotten service in the prison service – we never get recognised for anything unless something goes wrong. But it is what it is and we just get on with it.”
The Ministry of Justice told HuffPost UK it would be wrong to say coronavirus was spreading rapidly in jails.
Prisons minister Lucy Frazer last week announced that steps to separate prisoners with symptoms and quarantine new arrivals had limited the spread of coronavirus cases in jails.
And she said the majority of those infected had now made a successful recovery.
“I cannot express sufficient gratitude to the hard-working prison and healthcare staff, and prisoners, who have allowed this to take place,” she added. “My thoughts are with all of those affected by this terrible virus.”
Other measures introduced by government to ease pressure on jails include the early release of low-risk offenders, temporary expansion of the prison estate, and work to reduce the number of people held on remand.
A Prison Service spokesperson said: “We have taken strong measures to protect the NHS and save lives. Public Health England says these steps are working and limiting the spread of coronavirus in prisons.
“Personal protective equipment is being provided to officers and we’re giving prisoners secure phones so they can keep in contact with their loved ones.”
The MoJ said it had no record of issues with lack of medication or of a temporary morgue being set up and it was unable to verify this without further information about which prisons these allegations related to.