The ICRC’s assistance to the Pul-e-Charkhi prison includes improving healthcare facilities, upgrading COVID-19 detection procedures and contributing to the setup of isolation areas for COVID-19 positive detainees. We also provided top-to-bottom PPE to prison staff – consisting of gloves, face masks, gowns, aprons, protective glasses, caps, shoe covers, soap and disinfectant – in addition to infrared thermometers.
In other parts of the country, Bagram prison in Parwan, Sarpoza prison in Kandahar, and Herat prison, have also been provided with the same equipment.
Besides this, the ICRC offered financial incentives for health staff recruited for the COVID-19 response across several prisons, including female staff for screening points established at the main entry point of Pul-e-Charkhi’s complex. These endeavors allow medical staff to adequately attend to detainees, and to detect and contain the spread of the disease more effectively.
Apart from material and financial support at the level of detention facilities, the ICRC provided technical advice to Pul-e-Charkhi and other prisons’ authorities throughout the country on how to implement the COVID-19 Emergency Response Plan adopted by the Ministry of Public Health and the General Directorate of Prisons and Detention Centers.
