Guest editorial

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1108/IJPH-03-2023-119
• Published date: 16 March 2023
• Date: 16 March 2023
• Pages: 1-3
• Subject Matter: Health & social care,Criminology & forensic psychology,Prisoner health,Sociology,Sociology of crime & law,Public policy & environmental management,Policing,Criminal justice
• Author: Stephanie Grace Prost,Nickolas Zaller,Brie Williams

Guest editorial

Stephanie Grace Prost, Nickolas Zaller and Brie Williams

The number of older adults incarcerated in US prisons has burgeoned over the past

20 years (Carson, 2022; Williams et al., 2021). By the end of 2021, persons aged 55

years or older constituted 15.6% of populations held in state prisons and 13.3% of

those in federal prisons (Carson, 2022). This means roughly 178,000 older persons are

incarcerated in US prisons –up from 165,700 in 2020 (Carson, 2021). Moreover, most

individuals who are under correctional control serve time in the community on probation or

parole. These populations have also grown markedly, tripling since 1980 (Pew Charitable

Trusts, 2018);inclusion of persons aged 55 years or older in these settings no doubtamplifies

the number of older persons under correctional control, though no national statistics have

been compiledregarding the age of persons on probation and parole since 1995.

Because health care for older adults is exceedingly complex and costly when compared to

younger adults, this large and growing older adult population under correctional control

(prisons, jails, parole or probation) ought to sound an alarm through the public health and

carceral fields. In this special issue of the International Journal of Prisoner Health, authors

describe their findings related to the continuum of care that exists for older adults with

criminal legal system involvement including programs in prisons and jails, reentry and

transitional services, compassionate release and community supervision. Readers are

encouraged to embrace strategies that target the unique health and social needs of older

adults during incarceration and throughout the community transition process. Though an

overarching effort to divert older adults from incarceration is urgently needed, correctional

programs and related services during incarceration are essential to mitigating both

chronic and acute medical problems and to staving off the cognitive decline and mental

illness in older adulthood of which persons in carceral settings are at disproportionate risk

(Ahalt et al., 2018;Kuffel et al., 2022;Li et al., 2022). Scholars have noted a dearth of

programs directed toward older adults with criminal legal system involvement (Canada

et al., 2020) and efforts to increase and enhance these approaches constitute a critical

opportunity for leadership in carceral settings. Tailored programs are essential to

maintaining and enhancing positive health and social outcomes of those who are eligible

for release and, importantly, those sentenced to life (with and without the opportunity for

parole)ordeath–of which an exceedingly large proportion are older adul ts. Roughly 26%

of older adults in one sample were serving life, virtual life or death sentences (Prost et al.,

2020), a rate double that of national samples of persons who are incarcerated (13.9%;

Nellis, 2017).

Critically, programs and services within jails and prisons are unlikely to meet every need of

older adults. For this reason, optimizinggeriatric parole, compassionate release and related

mechanisms is essential. These mechanismsallow the termination or conversion of a prison

sentence to one served in the community for persons who meet certain health- and charge-

related criteria, though greatvariability exists between jurisdictions (Holland et al.,2020).As

learned during COVID-19,such strategies contributed to the rapid decarcerationof the most

vulnerable from the Federal Bureau of Prisons (FBOP; approximately 3,200 people), though

most releases were at the hands of federal judges rather than FBOP leadership [Equal

Justice Initiative (EJI), 2021]. Yet, many older adults who qualify for compassionate release

are not released (Pittaro,2023).

Stephanie Grace Prost is

based at the Raymond A.

Kent School of Social Work,

University of Louisville,

Louisville, Kentucky, USA.

Nickolas Zaller is based at

the University of Arkansas

for Medical Sciences, Little

Rock, Arkansas, USA. Brie

Williams is based at the

School of Medicine, Center

for Vulnerable Populations,

UCSF, San Francisco,

California, USA.

DOI 10.1108/IJPH-03-2023-119 VOL. 19 NO. 1 2023, pp. 1-3, ©Emerald Publishing Limited, ISSN 1744-9200 jINTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PRISONER HEALTH jPAGE 1