In April 2020, 78 percent of inmates at a state prison in Ohio tested positive for the novel coronavirus; one month later, 70 percent of those incarcerated at the federal prison in Lompoc, California, tested positive. Although they are thousands of kilometers apart, the confirmed cases of coronavirus in these prison populations—withmostly Black prisoners—reveal that the increasing death counts are not an aberration but part of the ongoing tragedy that is built into the prisonindustrial system. Unfortunately, the prisons reused 90 percent of their air, creating a contagious incubator for the hundreds of inmates incarcerated there. The novel coronavirus spreads through the air, so for many people awaiting the end of their sentences their poorly ventilated cells have been sources of contagion. With 1.5 million people incarcerated in U.S. prisons and Black Americans being disproportionately incarcerated, the spread of the coronavirus pandemic for people living in forced confinement has resulted in prison becoming a “contagious incubator.” As the Lancet reported in May 2020, prisons do not have the capacity to contain the virus by isolating those infected; the COVID-19 pandemic has shown how closed environments provide ample opportunity for the virus to spread, often making medical staff and visitors, as well as other inmates, vulnerable to contagion. The conditions in jails are even worse when people are denied adequate cleaning supplies. These facts about the COVID-19 crisis speak to a broader issue about the problems of confinement in a carceral state. During this public health crisis, advocates for incarcerated people, such as the ACLU, have called for themost vulnerable to be released for their own protection and that of those around them. They have also called for further isolation and better ventilation to prevent more people from becoming infected. At first glance, one might interpret the prison coronavirus outbreak solely as a political question and regard the contagion there as an extension of a failed political system. Yet the conditions of prisoners point to something deeper, and behind

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令人不安的（后）殖民医学史：走向人类的实践

2020 年 4 月，俄亥俄州一所州立监狱中 78% 的囚犯的新型冠状病毒检测呈阳性；一个月后，70% 被关押在加利福尼亚州隆波克联邦监狱的人的检测结果呈阳性。尽管它们相距数千公里，但这些监狱人口（主要是黑人囚犯）中确诊的冠状病毒病例表明，死亡人数的增加并不是一种失常现象，而是监狱工业系统中正在发生的悲剧的一部分。不幸的是，监狱重复使用了 90% 的空气，为监禁在那里的数百名囚犯创造了一个具有传染性的孵化器。新型冠状病毒通过空气传播，因此对于许多等待刑期结束的人来说，他们通风不良的牢房一直是传染源。美国有 150 万人被监禁 监狱和非裔美国人被不成比例地监禁，冠状病毒大流行对生活在强制监禁中的人的传播导致监狱成为“传染性孵化器”。正如《柳叶刀》在 2020 年 5 月报道的那样，监狱没有能力通过隔离感染者来控制病毒；COVID-19 大流行表明，封闭的环境如何为病毒提供充足的传播机会，通常使医务人员和访客以及其他囚犯容易受到传染。当人们得不到足够的清洁用品时，监狱的条件就更糟了。这些关于 COVID-19 危机的事实说明了一个更广泛的问题，即关押在监禁状态下的问题。在这场公共卫生危机期间，美国公民自由联盟等被监禁者的倡导者，呼吁释放最脆弱的人，以保护他们自己和周围的人。他们还呼吁进一步隔离和改善通风，以防止更多人被感染。乍一看，人们可能会将监狱冠状病毒的爆发仅仅解释为一个政治问题，并将那里的传染病视为失败的政治制度的延伸。然而，囚犯的处境指向了更深层次的东西，背后