Timothy Harding

AIDS IN PRISON

A survey carried out in 17 countries on behalf of the Council of Europe shows how prison doctors and administrations have reacted to the AIDS epidemic in ways that are not always scientifically and ethically sound. The pressing need to control HIV infection in prison, to counsel and support seropositive prisoners, to care for prisoners who get AIDS, and to cope with the psychosocial pressures within a closed, authoritarian environment pose a serious challenge to prison medical services; it is far from certain that they have sufficient resources and professional independence to cope. Failure to react adequately to the AIDS epidemic in prisons would have serious consequences both for the community as a whole and for the ethical position of prison doctors.

Preventing human rights violations in places of detention: a European initiative.

International human rights law defines certain fundamental freedoms which individuals should enjoy and proscribes a number of actions by the State or its agents, such as torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment. Its major defect is a lack of effective procedures by which individuals can file complaints and through which states can be condemned for violations. The [European] Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms has been ratified by over 30 European states and is commonly known as the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR).1 It is remarkable not for the originality of the rights defined and protected but for its provisions, which are to a significant extent, enforceable by supranational legal procedures accessible to individuals as well as to states. Thus, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) regularly finds that states have been parties to human rights violations, and obligates them to pay damages to individuals concerned. The ECtHRs decisions also oblige states to modify national legislation and to change procedures which they determine constitute human rights violations.