State prison AIDS deaths drop

[Nemesis]

But treatment costs take up about 25% of corrections' budget for all drugs
Orlando Sentinel
By Ron Word | The Associated Press
Posted July 11, 2004

Like a double sentence. (OSCAR SOSA/THE ASSOCIATED PRESS)
Jul 11, 2004

JASPER -- Johnny Davis escaped the death penalty when he was convicted of murdering a hitchhiker nearly two decades ago. Now he has a death sentence from which there is no appeal. Davis has AIDS.

"To me, it's like a living hell," said the 40-year-old inmate, locked up for life in this North Florida town.

Florida led the nation with 39 AIDS deaths in prison in 2001, the most recent year for which federal statistics are available, followed by 32 in Texas and 28 in New York. Those states also accounted for about half of all HIV-infected inmates in the nation in 2001, with 5,500 in New York, 2,602 in Florida and 2,388 in Texas.

But the death rate has steadily decreased since 1995 as new drugs have become available to treat the disease more aggressively. The rate of AIDS deaths in prisons nationwide dropped from 100 per 100,000 inmates in 1995 to 20 in 2001.

In Florida, the number of AIDS-inmate deaths dropped from 150 in 1995 to just three so far in 2004.

While the death rate has declined, the cost of treating AIDS prisoners has increased to $10.1 million a year in Florida because of the high cost of the therapy. That's about a quarter of the state Department of Corrections' budget for all drugs. And the AIDS drugs only postpone the inevitable. Since 1995, 663 Florida inmates have died of AIDS-related illness.

The Florida prisons agency knows of 3,226 prisoners who are HIV-positive and another 538 who have full-blown AIDS, but there may be many others. The number of HIV-positive inmates represents about 4.1 percent of Florida's 77,000 prisoners and is more than double the national average, according to the U.S. Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Statistics.

Florida prison officials don't know exactly how many HIV-positive inmates it has, because an AIDS test is not mandatory, and the department will only test those who ask. The exception, based on a state law passed two years ago, requires inmates leaving prison to have an HIV test. If they test positive, they are given a one-month supply of AIDS drugs when they are freed.

The percentage of female prisoners with AIDS is always higher, primarily because of illegal-drug use, prostitution and other hazardous lifestyles, prison officials say. The number of female prisoners HIV-positive in 2001 in Florida was 9.3 percent, although it has dropped to 7 percent this year. The same year, the percentage of male prisoners who were HIV-positive in Florida was 3.2 percent.

Dr. Dianne Rechtine, head of health services-clinical for the Florida corrections department, said most of the HIV in prisons can be tied to drug use.

"We already know substance abuse and unsafe sex go together," Rechtine said.

Davis, who receives five anti-AIDS drugs every day, said he's not sure where he contracted the AIDS virus. It may have been from a fight with two other inmates who were HIV-positive. But he admits he could have gotten it from drug use or the multicolored prison tattoos that cover his arms.

"I'm an ex-junkie and I have done drugs in prison," he said. Davis, married to a woman outside prison, denies participating in risky homosexual activity in prison, although he called the state's prison system "a breeding ground for HIV." He thinks the disease is spread through consensual homosexual activity and rape.

State-prisons spokesman Sterling Ivey disputes Davis' assertion.

"We are delivering medical care to inmates on a level consistent to what is being delivered to others in the community," Ivey said. "I don't view us a breeding ground for HIV."