The majority of convicts in the world are housed in the United States, and Texas is the state with the highest jail population.
According to a recent study led by researchers at Brown University’s School of Public Health, the approximately 160,000 inmates in Texas prisons as well as those who work in these facilities experience severe physical stress in prisons without climate controls as climate change continues to worsen the severity, frequency, and duration of heat waves.
The study, published in JAMA Network Open on Wednesday, Nov. 2, examined the relationship between heat exposure and mortality risks in Texas prisons, focusing on how these risks vary between prisons with air conditioning and those without it.
The researchers analyzed data gathered between 2001 and 2019 showing that 271 people died due to extreme heat exposure during that timeframe.
The researchers discovered that even a 1 degree increase above 85 degrees Fahrenheit can raise the probability of dying every day by 0.7%.
The research team, which included members from Harvard University, Boston University, Texas Prison Community Advocates, and Brown University, combined data from the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics on mortality in Texas prisons with temperature data from NASA and used a novel epidemiologic analysis to come to its conclusions.
It is important to note that while an average of 14 people died each year from heat-related causes in Texas prisons without air conditioning, not a single heat-related death occurred in climate-controlled prisons.
Julie Skarha
The team found that in Texas jail institutions without air conditioning, almost 13% of mortality during warm months may be related to heat.
“It is important to note that while an average of 14 people died each year from heat-related causes in Texas prisons without air conditioning, not a single heat-related death occurred in climate-controlled prisons,” said lead study author Julie Skarha, who received her Ph.D. in epidemiology from Brown in June 2022.
“The majority of Texas prisons do not have universal air conditioning,” Skarha said. “And in these settings, we found a 30-fold increase in heat-related mortality when compared to estimates of heat-related mortality in the general U.S. population.”
Study co-author Dr. David Dosa, an associate professor of medicine, and health services, policy and practice at Brown, pointed out that heat is often a silent killer.
“We have seen similar situations in nursing homes, where heat isn’t reported on the death certificate,” said Dosa, a practicing geriatrician with dual appointments at the Providence V.A. Medical Center and Rhode Island Hospital. “It’s only after we run these analyses that we can determine how much of a role heat played in someone’s death.”
The results, according to the researchers, point to the possibility that Texas jails’ adoption of an air conditioning policy could play a significant role in safeguarding the health of those who reside there and those who work there.
Other study authors included Dr. Josiah Rich and David Savitz from Brown, Amite Dominick from Texas Prison Community Advocates, Keith Spangler from Boston University and Antonella Zanobetti from Harvard. The study was supported by grants from the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities and from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.
