Associate Professor, School of Law, Faculty of Business & Law, Deakin University, Melbourne Burwood Campus, Australia.
School of Business, Law and Entrepreneurship, Swinburne University of Technology.
J Law Med. 2024 May;31(1):42-69.
People are sent to prison as punishment and not to experience additional punishment. Nevertheless, this principle is habitually violated in Australia: prisoners frequently receive health care that is inferior to health care that is available in the general community. Numerous official inquiries have identified deficiencies in prisoner health services, notwithstanding the apparent intention of legislative provisions and non-statutory guidelines and policies in various jurisdictions to ensure prisoners receive appropriate health care. This article proposes law reforms to address this human rights crisis. It recommends the passage of uniform legislation in all Australian jurisdictions that stipulates minimum prison health care service standards, as well as mechanisms for ensuring they are implemented. The article also suggests that, in the short-term, until prison health care is significantly improved, substandard health care for prisoners should be treated as a potentially mitigating sentencing factor that can reduce the length of a defendant's prison term.
人们被送进监狱是作为惩罚，而不是为了遭受额外的惩罚。然而，这一原则在澳大利亚经常被违反：囚犯经常接受的医疗保健不如普通社区提供的医疗保健。尽管立法规定以及各司法管辖区的非法定准则和政策显然有意确保囚犯获得适当的医疗保健，但许多官方调查已经发现囚犯医疗服务存在缺陷。本文提出了法律改革措施，以解决这一人权危机。它建议在澳大利亚所有司法管辖区通过统一立法，规定最低监狱医疗保健服务标准，以及确保这些标准得到实施的机制。本文还建议，在短期内，直到监狱医疗保健得到显著改善之前，应将囚犯的医疗保健不足视为潜在的减轻量刑因素，可以减少被告的刑期。
