The conference brought together all the country's 22 prison commanders for a planning and strategy meeting, including the response to COVID-19. Prisons, which are often overcrowded, are at risk of an explosive outbreak of COVID-19. The first day of the five-day event focused on strengthening preparations for dealing with the coronavirus, especially now that the more contagious delta variant is sweeping across the Pacific.
ICRC has been supporting a technical working group, including representatives from the National Pandemic Control Centre and the National Department of Health, and advising the CS headquarters. The group has steered publication of a 30-page plan that sets out the infection prevention and control measures a prison can implement to reduce the chance of COVID-19 getting into a prison in the first place and, if those defences are breached, how to prevent one case from becoming a major, and potentially fatal, outbreak.