Filed
12:00 p.m. EDT
05.10.2025
A brand new report sheds mild on pregnant folks behind bars, however misses their lived expertise.
A pregnant girl incarcerated on the Wyoming Ladies’s Middle in Lusk, Wyoming, 2015.
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When the Bureau of Justice Statistics launched the first-ever nationwide take a look at reproductive points in state and federal prisons in April, it answered some long-standing questions, whereas elevating a couple of extra, about being pregnant and maternal care behind bars.
Though ladies are the fastest-growing phase of the jail inhabitants, no company tracks important statistics on being pregnant and reproductive care in state and federal prisons. The BJS launch coated a couple of key knowledge factors: The variety of pregnant folks in state and federal prisons in 2023, the outcomes of their pregnancies over the course of the yr, and the form of maternal well being providers that prisons say they supply. It doesn’t embrace personal amenities and native jails, the place pregnancies are way more frequent.
Whereas the BJS knowledge is now probably the most complete take a look at what occurs in our state and federal prisons, it’s lacking an enormous piece of the story. A fast scan of the findings could recommend that prisons do a great job of caring for pregnant folks as a result of they provide many crucial maternal care providers. However with out accompanying narratives from the a whole lot of pregnant folks in jail, it’s exhausting to know the way these providers are really used.
Extra importantly, the anecdotal tales which have trickled out of prisons over time recommend that being pregnant behind bars is a harrowing expertise at greatest.
Right here’s a fast snapshot of what the BJS discovered of their research of fifty states and the federal jail system. On Dec. 31, 2023, there have been over 300 pregnant ladies within the 49 jurisdictions that supplied knowledge. In that calendar yr, there have been 727 pregnancies that led to beginning or another end result. The overwhelming majority of these ladies — 91% — had reside births. Roughly 6% miscarried, 2% terminated their pregnancies, and some had a stillbirth or an ectopic being pregnant. The BJS didn’t monitor toddler or maternal mortality.
Researchers have identified that these findings don’t sq. with earlier knowledge assortment efforts on being pregnant outcomes in prisons and jails. In 2016, researchers at Johns Hopkins College carried out the primary large-scale knowledge assortment of being pregnant behind bars, which included 22 states, a handful of jails and the Bureau of Prisons. The researchers discovered that roughly 4% of girls in 22 states examined optimistic for being pregnant upon getting into jail, in comparison with the two% the BJS discovered throughout practically all states and the BOP.
The BJS launch additionally supplied a snapshot of maternal healthcare behind bars. The overwhelming majority of jail techniques stated they examined for being pregnant throughout consumption, educated employees on how you can take care of pregnant ladies, and had infrastructure in place to take care of pregnant folks on web site or a plan in place to switch them off-site. Each jurisdiction stated they supplied routine medical appointments, together with post-delivery follow-ups. And practically all amenities stated they supplied screening for postpartum despair.
Earlier stories name into query ladies’s entry to those important providers. Final yr, the U.S. Authorities Accountability Workplace printed its findings on being pregnant in prisons and jails. The GAO recognized quite a few boundaries to care, together with copayments that pressured incarcerated ladies to pay for their very own medical care, stigma from guards and primary logistical challenges of transportation to off-site appointments. In contrast to the BJS knowledge, the GAO inspectors carried out a qualitative evaluation, talking instantly with a handful of jail officers and greater than two dozen incarcerated pregnant and postpartum ladies. Additionally they reviewed a decade of analysis on being pregnant and maternal care behind bars.
When requested about their care, a few of the ladies shared their challenges. A number of of the ladies interviewed stated the care they obtained was “okay, or had blended emotions.” Two stated the care they obtained was “not good, or that their wants weren’t addressed by care suppliers.” One girl informed the inspectors that she didn’t obtain the treatment she was prescribed. One other stated she requested for despair treatment and temper stabilizers to be restarted after giving beginning, however didn’t obtain them. One girl requested to be taken to the hospital for low blood stress, however was denied.
Jail guards are a serious impediment. All prisoners, together with pregnant folks, need to undergo corrections officers to get medical care. In a 2020 article for the Harvard Regulation Evaluation, Dr. Carolyn Sufrin, a main researcher on reproductive points behind bars, says that corrections officers shouldn’t stand between pregnant folks and entry to reproductive care. Signs of being pregnant issues could be delicate. “Gentle bleeding, cramping, or perhaps a headache” could possibly be indicators of labor or one thing extra critical that requires rapid medical consideration, she famous. When a lady comes ahead with a priority, guards are tasked with making their very own “unqualified evaluation” on whether or not she wants care.
In six states — Alaska, Hawaii, Iowa, Maine, Nevada and Washington — guards obtain no coaching on how you can take care of pregnant prisoners, the BJS report discovered.
“A pregnant individual in custody doesn’t have the liberty to name their well being care supplier or an ambulance or to go to a hospital, however should as a substitute notify a custody officer who serves, functionally, because the gatekeeper to a pregnant individual accessing medical personnel,” Sufrin famous.
Pregnant persons are additionally susceptible to the informal cruelty that may pervade jail tradition. At York Correctional Establishment in Connecticut, one girl wound up giving beginning into a bathroom in 2018. The girl’s mom, Karine Laboy, testified in entrance of Congress final yr as a part of an inquiry into being pregnant circumstances in prisons and jails, led by Sen. John Ossoff, chair of the U.S. Senate’s Human Rights Subcommittee.
Laboy informed senators that her daughter started bleeding whereas utilizing the lavatory. Safety footage exhibits that she positioned a T-shirt between her legs and tried to stroll to breakfast. When she returned, the shirt was soaked in blood. She known as out for assist, however no person got here. “My granddaughter was born into the bathroom bowl,” Laboy testified. “When jail medical employees lastly arrived, their response was merciless and insensitive. They joked that my granddaughter had ‘took her first swim’ and proceeded to chop her umbilical twine inside a unclean jail cell.”
Earlier this yr, Ossoff launched a invoice that will require state amenities to report knowledge on pregnant and postpartum prisoners to the U.S. Lawyer Common. Failure to report would lead to a ten% discount in federal funding. Ossoff’s inquiry “uncovered pervasive abuse of pregnant ladies in jail,” together with pressured C-sections, unlawful shackling and punitive denials of postpartum care. The invoice, which was referred to the Judiciary Committee in February, is an try and right the longstanding data hole in regards to the experiences of pregnant folks behind bars.
Higher knowledge might assist guarantee ladies obtain higher care, researchers argue. Ossoff’s invoice would acquire a wider vary of knowledge than the BJS report. States must present particulars on whether or not or not ladies obtained pre- and postnatal care and when. And it will require the legal professional common’s workplace to conduct a research to grasp the connection between jail practices and stillbirths, miscarriages, and toddler and maternal deaths.
“With out knowledge, we can not know the complete scope of the issues — and their options,” Sufrin testified throughout the inquiry final summer season. “Our nation’s conscience should see that what occurs — or doesn’t occur — to pregnant ladies behind bars is a human rights situation.”
