‘Imminent health disaster’ as scabies spreads among Palestinian prisoners in Israel’s jails

The Prisoners’ Affairs Authority and the Palestinian Prisoners’ Club have warned of an “imminent health disaster” in Israel’s Negev Prison where thousands of Palestinians are imprisoned, due to the spread of scabies among prisoners.

The rights groups accused the Israel Prison Service of  “concealing” the reasons that led to the outbreak of the disease and why it spread as well as of “deliberately depriving prisoners of treatment” and using it as a “tool to torture them physically and psychologically.”

They also accused the Israeli authorities of seeking “to kill prisoners by any possible means”, including facilitating the spread of the skin disease by denying them access to showers, clean clothes or washing machines.

They warned that disease threatens the lives of hundreds of prisoners who suffer from chronic and difficult health conditions.

A prisoner identified only by his initials, R.M., who contracted the disease said he was brutally assaulted in November last year in Ramla Prison where he remained for several months using a wheelchair.

In July, he was relocated to Negev Prison where he continued to suffer from severe pain in his foot, and is in need of a crutch to move.

R.M. said after contracting scabies he did not receive any treatment, noting that he is imprisoned in a small cell with nine other prisoners, all of whom are infected with scabies.

Scabies is a contagious skin condition caused by mites burrowing into the skin and laying eggs, which causes intense itching and a rash:

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