Bad medicine in Louisiana prisons

For Scalawag Magazine, According to reports obtained by Scalawag, 10 out of 11 doctors overseeing health care for prisoners in the Louisiana Department of Corrections have a restricted medical license.

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People in Louisiana prisons are dying painful deaths under the care of ill-equipped physicians, according to multiple lawsuits filed against the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections. 

In Louisiana prisons, 10/11 doctors have previously suspended licenses. Some still have active restrictions on the care they can provide, like prescribing pain meds, which means limited care for the 33,000 people Louisiana confines in their prisons.

These doctors' histories also include sexually assaulting patients, writing under-the-table narcotic prescriptions, possessing child pornography, and drinking alcohol on-duty.

Not only that, but the person who all these doctors report to—and state lawmakers interface with—has one of the most heinous histories of medical neglect and poor care out of them all.

The result puts the 34,000 people currently incarcerated in Louisiana at risk of preventable suffering from treatable conditions or illnesses—or worse, dying an unnecessary or excessively painful death. 

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