(Source: WIS) By Howard Ballou | January 20, 2021 at 9:41 PM CST - Updated January 21 at 8:44 AM
JACKSON, Miss. (WLBT) - With 343,000 U.S. inmates testing positive for COVID-19 and over 2,100 dying from the virus, Mississippi’s 17,000 prisoners are among the safest from the virus according to comparable figures in other states and those compiled by inmate-advocacy groups, stated the Marshall Project.
Mississippi Department of Corrections has registered 1,383 COVID-positive inmates, which is 32 times less than the nation’s most infected prison systems, California and federal prisons, each with 44,000 prisoners who’ve tested positive for COVID-19.
But the most critical figure of all, inmate COVID-19 deaths, stands at 21 in Mississippi, the lowest number by far of COVID-related deaths in southern states, compared with Florida at 204 deaths; Texas at 177; and Georgia at 87.