Incarceration of women in the United States

Federal Prison Camp, Alderson, a Federal Bureau of Prisons facility for women in West Virginia

The incarceration of women in the United States refers to the imprisonment of women in both prisons and jails in the United States. There are approximately 219,000 incarcerated women in the US according to a November 2018 report by the Prison Policy Initiative,[1] and the rate of incarceration of women in the United States is at a historic and global high, with 133 women in correctional facilities per every 100,000 female citizens. The United States is home to just 4% of the world's female population, yet the US is responsible for 33% of the entire world's incarcerated female population.[2] The steep rise in the population of incarcerated women in the US is linked to the complex history of the war on drugs and the US's prison–industrial complex, which lead to mass incarceration among many demographics, but had particularly dramatic impacts on women and especially women of color.[3][4] However, women made up only 10.4% of the US prison and jail population, as of 2015.[5][6]

The conditions of correctional facilities which house women can be a major cause of health and human rights concerns. Given that the steep rise in the population of incarcerated women has been a relatively recent phenomenon, prisons and jails originally built to accommodate male prisoners have not been adjusted to meet the special needs of women, like providing pregnancy and prenatal care, other gynecological services, mental healthcare, and adequate accommodation for things like menstrual hygiene.[7][8][9][10] Issues with standards of care and adequate prison conditions are worsened by a lack of standards on data collecting and also by the privatization of prison healthcare services, which cannot be as tightly regulated as public services.[11]

  1. ^ Kajstura, Aleks (November 13, 2018). "Women's Mass Incarceration: The Whole Pie 2018". prisonpolicy.org. Retrieved March 22, 2019.
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