Spending time in prison is well known to be a risk factor for early death 鈥� usually after inmates have left the relative safety of jail. Now a study of Australian prisoners has identified who is at greatest risk.
Azar Kariminia of the University of New South Wales and her colleagues analysed deaths among 85,203 adults with a history of imprisonment in New South Wales between 1988 and 2002. Male prisoners were almost four times as likely to die as men in the general population of a similar age, while for female prisoners the risk was eight times that of other women.
Women under 20, multiple offenders and people imprisoned for property and violence offences were at particularly high risk, 鈥渂ecause they are often heavily involved in drugs鈥�, Kariminia says.
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鈥淧eople imprisoned for property and violent offences were at particularly high risk鈥�
People who had been hospitalised with mental illnesses while in prison were at twice the risk of suicide compared with those not hospitalised during imprisonment. One way to reduce death rates would be to formalise the transfer of healthcare from the prison system to the community, the researchers say (European Journal of Epidemiology, ).
