Visiting can resume on Friday at California prisons, because the H1N1 flu has turned out to be milder than initially feared, corrections and prison health officials said Wednesday.
The state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation largely deferred to the special office charged with overseeing prison health care in reaching the decision, said Scott Kernan, the department's undersecretary.
The decision comes eight days after the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that schools no longer needed to be closed because some students had the swine flu. On May 5, the CDC said the novel influenza strain was too mild to warrant further school closures.
Prisons aren't like the schools because inmates are closely packed together around the clock, said Dr. Dwight Winslow, acting chief medical officer for the California Prison Health Care Services, which oversees inmate health care in the wake of federal court decisions.
"The potential for rapid transmission is much, much greater," he said. Prison health officials decided to allow visiting to resume after seeing the flu had not spread widely, but there was no single factor leading to the decision, Winslow said, just "common sense" medical judgment.
During the visiting suspension, the prison system had to postpone its special "Get on the Bus" program, an annual event that helps children visit their relatives around the time of Mother's Day. That event now is scheduled for June 26 at three women's facilities.
Call The Bee's Carrie Peyton Dahlberg, (916) 321-1086.
What You Should Know About Comments on Sacbee.com
Sacbee.com is happy to provide a forum for reader interaction, discussion, feedback and reaction to our stories. However, we reserve the right to delete inappropriate comments or ban users who can't play nice. (See our full terms of service here.)
Here are some rules of the road:
• Keep your comments civil. Don't insult one another or the subjects of our articles. If you think a comment violates our guidelines click the "report abuse" button to notify the moderators. Responding to the comment will only encourage bad behavior.
• Don't use profanities, vulgarities or hate speech. This is a general interest news site. Sometimes, there are children present. Don't say anything in a way you wouldn't want your own child to hear.
• Do not attack other users; focus your comments on issues, not individuals.
• Stay on topic. Only post comments relevant to the article at hand. If you want to discuss an issue with a specific user, click on his profile name and send him a direct message.
• Do not copy and paste outside material into the comment box.
• Don't repeat the same comment over and over. We heard you the first time.
• Do not use the commenting system for advertising. That's spam and it isn't allowed.
• Don't use all capital letters. That's akin to yelling and not appreciated by the audience.
You should also know that The Sacramento Bee does not screen comments before they are posted. You are more likely to see inappropriate comments before our staff does, so we ask that you click the "report abuse" button to submit those comments for moderator review. You also may notify us via email at feedback@sacbee.com. Note the headline on which the comment is made and tell us the profile name of the user who made the comment. Remember, comment moderation is subjective. You may find some material objectionable that we won't and vice versa.
If you submit a comment, the user name of your account will appear along with it. Users cannot remove their own comments once they have submitted them, but you may ask our staff to retract one of your comments by sending an email to feedback@sacbee.com. Again, make sure you note the headline on which the comment is made and tell us your profile name.
About Comments
Reader comments on Sacbee.com are the opinions of the writer, not The Sacramento Bee. If you see an objectionable comment, click the "report abuse" button below it. We will delete comments containing inappropriate links, obscenities, hate speech, and personal attacks. Flagrant or repeat violators will be banned. See more about comments here.