3 Officers At Montco Correctional Facility Have Coronavirus

EAGLEVILLE, PA — Three prison guards at Montgomery County Correctional Facility in Eagleville have tested positive for coronavirus, officials confirmed on Monday. It's not believed they had contact with any inmates, and there are no positives in the population of the facility as of Monday afternoon.

The news comes just as the first case was found in an inmate at SCI Phoenix in Skippack Township over the weekend, leading Monday to a quarantine of the entire state prison system.

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Contact tracing for all three of the Montgomery County corrections officers has been completed, Montgomery County Commissioner Val Arkoosh said in a press conference Monday. None of the officers who had contact with the infected individuals is showing symptoms, but all are self-quarantining. They are awaiting test results to see if they have contracted the virus.

Officials are working to reduce prison populations both in the state system and at the county level. Arkoosh said that the daily number of new admissions to Montgomery County Correctional Facility has dropped from a previous average of 28, to just eight. Early parole, electronic monitoring, deferral of sentencing, and administrative penalties for nonviolent crimes are a few of the alternatives being explored.

The state prison system quarantine imposes strict restrictions on inmate movement, ordering meal delivery in cells and taking prisoners one by one out for phone calls or library access. Though Montgomery County Correctional Facility has not yet imposed that level of quarantine, they have suspended all visits and are screening all personnel who enter the facility.

Activists have been calling for drastic reductions in prison populations since the outbreak of the virus, citing inhumane conditions and the likelihood that the virus would spread very rapidly once it got inside the tight, densely populated quarters of a prison.

As of Monday afternoon, 48 people had died around the state from coronavirus, with 4,087 positive cases all told. Montgomery County announced its sixth death on Monday.

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