Introduction

Since March 2020, European prison services suffer from the Covid threat. They have addressed many challenges during the first phases of the Covid pandemic with the pursuit to prevent the Covid threat from entering prison facilities, while maintaining safety and protecting human rights standards. Towards this end, prison services sought innovative solutions and shared learning experiences from the Covid crisis. However, Covid-19 remains an immense threat to the prison services, and with the alterations of the virus and the unprecedented rise of overcrowding, prisons become more vulnerable to Covid infection and other transmittable diseases. EuroPris as always has the role of facilitating and promoting networking for exchanging and sharing information, experiences, and good practices. In addition to the data collection on Covid-19, it has been decided to form a working group aiming to produce a practice collection, showcasing reforms and innovations implemented in the prison context. The group will work on a number of subtopics regarding Covid-19 in prisons, to which you can suggest more subtopics than the proposed ones:

• Early release measures – Alternatives to detention
• Crisis management
• Leadership
• Family relations (i.e. physical visits, online visits, phone calls)
• Technology (tablets, smartphones, kiosks, PCs etc)
• In-cell services vs. Human interaction
• Trade union relations
• Staff (infections, training, psychological suffering, etc.)
• Management of infectious deceases (including Covid) inside and outside prisons – medical challenges in prisons
• Quarantine units
• Prison regime – new normality?
• Vaccinations of staff and inmates
• Visiting policies (i.e. safe-pass, rapid-test before entrance)
• Maintaining safety while safeguarding human rights (i.e. right to health, education, sports, etc.)
• Are there any rights that are more limited than others i.e. transfer of prisoners to attend family matters (family weddings, funerals, closed sick relatives)?
• How the migration flows have influenced the operations of prison services?

The work of the group will be coordinated by Athena Demetriou, Deputy Director-General, Cyprus Department of Prisons.

Nominate an expert

All EuroPris members are welcome to contribute to this innovative and valuable collection of Covid learnings. To nominate an expert; send a motivation letter and CV to [email protected] before 15 February 2022. Also, add your preferred issues to be incorporated in the work of the group. Experts will be selected based on their profile and the final set of topics to be addressed. A Terms of Reference document will be adopted including a workplan and operating procedures of the group. The expected life span of the group is March-September, with a possibility to prolong the group to the end of 2022. No travelling is expected for the members of the group.