Iran has done it in response to the current crisis and several US states have considered a similar measure. I imagine prisons are so tightly locked down that they would be last place an airborne disease would enter and prisoners would be safer to stay put unless they were due to be released anyway.
Also, are prisoners in these scenarios being let out on the streets with tags or being put under house arrest in quarantine? Because surely the first one would be much worse if their health was the concern.
In: Biology
Prisons aren’t tightly locked down, medically. They’re tightly locked down in terms of prisoners being able to escape, but the guards and the staff have “regular jobs” that involve going home after work, going to buy food, etc etc.
Lots of contact with the rest of the community, and if the community is infected, the guards and staff could get infected, and transmit it to the prisoner population.
So, in a quarantine situation like this, two things come into play:
1. Prisoners have rights as human beings, don’t want to keep them locked down in a crowded prison if there’s a bug going around.
2. Guards and staff may not be “essential” personnel, they may be required to stay home under the quarantine rules, and will likely want to be with their families. So the prison has to “close”.
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