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Increasing availability of COVID-19 vaccine to older adults under community supervision

Emily Dauria (Department of Behavioral and Community Health Sciences, School of Public Health, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA)
Angelo Clemenzi-Allen (Division of HIV, Infectious Diseases and Global Medicine, Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, California, USA and San Francisco Department of Public Health, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, California, USA)
Kathryn Nowotny (Department of Sociology, University of Miami, Coral Gables, Florida, USA)
Lauren Brinkley-Rubinstein (Department of Social Medicine, Center for Health Equity Research, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Carrboro, North Carolina, USA)
Brie Williams (Division of Geriatrics, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, California, USA)
Alysse Wurcel (Division of Geographic Medicine and Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, Tufts Medical Center, Boston, Massachusetts, USA)

International Journal of Prisoner Health

ISSN: 1744-9200

Article publication date: 15 November 2022

Issue publication date: 16 March 2023

70

Abstract

Purpose

Vaccinating adults who are involved with the carceral system, particularly those aged 55 or older, is crucial to containing the COVID-19 pandemic in the USA, particularly as variants continue to emerge and spread. In this Viewpoint, the authors discuss the reasons why improving access to COVID-19 vaccine and boosters among community supervised adults, especially the aging population, is critical to mitigating the public health consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. This study concludes by providing recommendations to enhance vaccine and booster uptake in this population, as the pandemic continues.

Design/methodology/approach

This is a Viewpoint paper regarding mitigating the spread of COVID-19 by improving access to vaccine and boosters among community supervised adults, especially the aging population.

Findings

A key population that has been overlooked in vaccination efforts are older adults involved in the carceral system who are living in the community (i.e. “community supervised” or people on probation or parole). Older adults on probation and parole are at high risk for SARS-CoV-2 transmission and severe disease due to numerous factors at the individual, community, social and structural levels.

Originality/value

Implementation of recommendations presented in this Viewpoint will mitigate COVID-19 risk among a population that has been marginalized and overlooked, yet has been the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

Dr Emily Dauria’s effort on this work was supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse [R34DA050480; PI Dauria].

Citation

Dauria, E., Clemenzi-Allen, A., Nowotny, K., Brinkley-Rubinstein, L., Williams, B. and Wurcel, A. (2023), "Increasing availability of COVID-19 vaccine to older adults under community supervision", International Journal of Prisoner Health, Vol. 19 No. 1, pp. 88-94. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJPH-06-2022-0035

Publisher

:

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2022, Emerald Publishing Limited

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