The future of prison health care: a critical analysis

Abstract

In 1999, in response to the ongoing controversy surrounding prison health care, the Home Office and the NHS Executive published The Future Organization of Prison Health Care. This article, building on interviews and field notes from research conducted in the health care centres of three local prisons, analyses and critiques the document's premises, and argues that, until the formal and informal networks of penal power are addressed, then the document's hopes for change are unlikely to be realized.