Health Care in U.S. Correctional Facilities — A Limited and Threatened Constitutional Right
By Marcella Alsan, M.D., Ph.D., M.P.H., Crystal S. Yang, J.D., Ph.D., James R. Jolin, Lucy Tu, and Josiah D. Rich, M.D., M.P.H.
“The U.S. Constitution does not guarantee a right to health care. Yet since 1976, the Supreme Court has held that deliberate indifference to the serious medical needs of incarcerated people — a population that is disproportionately sick, poor, and from marginalized racial and ethnic groups — violates the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment.”
