Corrections department says it’s asking National Guard to help monitor coronavirus
The South Carolina Department of Corrections is asking for National Guard troops to help prevent the spread of coronavirus in prisons, according to the department.
The corrections department will request 20 to 30 troops to help screen and monitor inmates for COVID-19 at three prisons: Allendale Correctional Institution, Lee Correctional Institution and the Kirkland intake center, spokesperson Chrysti Shain said.
“There is not a security issue,” she said. “It’s for medical help.”
The troops are being brought in to augment medical staff at the prison.
At least twice a day, about 1,600 inmates at Kirkland and Allendale must be monitored by taking temperatures, pulses, and checking for other symptoms, according to Shain. The prisons don’t have enough medical staff to do the daily checks of inmates for coronavirus.
The prisons are on lockdown after at least nine inmates in the two institutions tested positive for the virus in April.
Inmates with the coronavirus are being isolated and treated at the Kirkland and Lee prisons, where inmates, “cellmates and any other offenders who present as symptomatic also are being monitored,” Shain said in a statement.
“We’re grateful to Gen. Van McCarty and the National Guard for this collaboration in helping us keep staff and offenders safe during this unprecedented time,” said Bryan Stirling, director of the S.C. Department of Corrections.
McCarty, a major general, is South Carolina’s adjutant general.
As of Sunday, at least 43 correction department staff members have self reported testing positive for COVID-19, the SCDC said. Some of those staffers have recovered and were cleared to return to work.
The National Guard has been called in to help medical staffs with coronavirus screenings in prisons in Kansas, Ohio, Wisconsin and Illinois.