June 26, 2024, 07:00
2 min read
PALERMO – “Prison, for those who live in it, is hell. There is no other way to tell it.” Pine Learn, guarantor of the prisoners in Palermo, he knows those suffocating circles. And it’s not even a question of being bad or good: damnation arises from the precision mechanics of an upside-down place.
A kingdom of nonsense, of drifts, of suffering, despite the strenuous commitment of those who work and end up sharing the pain of an impossible freedom. This is what prison is.
But the original fault is not even in politics. We must go back to the social indifference that has delegated to bars and bolts the task of carpets to hide ‘dust of humanity’. It is worth talking about it, in the scorching summer that amplifies the discomfort in the cell.
“The inconveniences are well known – says Pino Apprendi -. I deal with Pagliarelli, Ucciardone and the juvenile, Malaspina. We suffer from the cold in winter and the heat in summer. There are problems with the water at Pagliarelli, so even the shower follows shifts. There is, in general, the problem of canteens on which the State spends very little. And there are people who are unable to take care of themselves properly.”
Learn delves into the healthcare discourse, behind the walls. “Prisoners wait months for a specialist visit because, obviously, they cannot turn to private individuals. When the shift finally arrives, there is not enough staff, the ambulance is missing…”.
“I know the story of a cancer patient in his seventies who is undergoing chemotherapy and is in prison, when an alternative sentence would be appropriate. Overcrowding doesn’t help. At Pagliarelli there are one thousand four hundred inmates, out of a thousand that could be accommodated. At Ucciardone there are five hundred”.
“There is the very thorny issue of psychiatric patients who should not be there – adds Pino Apprendi – there are those who are already sick when they enter. There are those who get sick afterwards. In fact, there are no alternative structures.”
“We need more prison police personnel, assistants, psychologists and doctors. You really wait a long time for a visit. I’ll give you an example. Toothache is a trivial thing, right? But if you have it, you suffer terribly. What if no one comes to your rescue?”, is the conclusion of the reasoning of Pino, a historic figure of social commitment.
Something is moving, the Palermo guarantor announces: meetings with the Conservatory and with trade associations: “Because those who face their sentence in semi-freedom are at less risk of reoffending”.
But it is always too hot in the cells and there will always be more. The summer which for many represents an invitation to light-heartedness, for the inmates, for the ‘human dust’, is just another and hotter circle of hell.
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Published on
June 26, 2024, 07:00
