The COVID-AM blog is a partnership between the UMI 3157 iGLOBES and the Institut des Amériques, coordinated by François-Michel Le Tourneau, Deputy Director and Marion Magnan, researcher at the Institute. About the blog.

by Lise Brun, coordinator of the Canadian office of the Institut des Amériques and doctoral student in Law at Bordeaux University and University of Montreal.

In Montreal, all announcements on the next phase of reopening are greeted with joy.

The answers to these questions from the authorities of Quebec have been rather surprising. On the topic of prisons particularly, the Prime minister François Legault at first said that nothing had been brought to the attention of the public authorities, even though the Ligue des droits et liberté had sent two letters early on asking that measures be taken quickly to avoid possible outbreaks, potentially tragic for the prisoners and the penitentiary personnel. It also took several weeks for the number of cases as well as the list of health measures put in place to be made public, this in variable conditions. For the provincial prisons, the numbers started being announced on April 29, which is already late. For other confined places, information is not available to the public, but given by the media when articles are focused on the issue. This lack of information is in stark contrast to the transparency that was displayed at the very beginning of the health crisis. Later, the Government declared that "it was going fairly well" [4] in the prisons in Quebec and that, because of this, no additional measures were needed for now [5].

This positive and reassuring speech strongly contrasted with the one groups for the defense of rights and freedoms of confined people and the personnel of confined places in Quebec tried to bring forward. Occasionally, the management of the health crisis in these different establishments was questioned in the media. First, the consistent lack of up-to-date emergency plans was pointed out, as well as the lack of equipment given to these establishments. In prison, for example, the personnel was given gloves and masks rather late and, in these particulary risky places, testing was never done systematically, neither for the personnel, nor for the detainees. Above all, the breadth in response to the crisis has been questionned since less detrimental measures to the rights and freedoms of confined people could have been used.

In the prisons and mental health institutions, many had to rely on isolation, for lack of sufficient options. So, as far as we know, several prisoners at the Prison de Bordeaux in units affected by Covid could not take a shower for several weeks. Yet, use of isolation which consists in keeping prisoners or residents in their cells or rooms for more than 22h per day is considered as torture by the United Nations if alternative measures can be taken, or if it is delayed beyond 15 days. On that subject, the UN as many other countries, the federal government and other Canadian provinces took strong measures early to free prisoners who were not a danger to public safety. In Quebec, would the quicker and larger release of prisoners allow for better lockdown conditions and limit the number of outbreaks in prison? Finally, you can certainly understand that visits were suspended mid-March in these places to avoid letting the virus enter. However, the fact that family members, if not lawyers, of the detainees were blocked from receiving any news for several days and up to several weeks because of the lack of means of communication given to them was also reviled. One can also question how fast young people, who have adjustment issues and who had already had all their cultural and physical activities suspended, were refused the visit of their family for close to eight weeks, especially since the government finally relaxed this decision [6].

No matter the number of cases or deaths, this information should have already affected François Legault's administration. During the lockdown, just as in non-pandemic periods, incarcerated people when under significant duress tend to pursue justice [7], but often also, set fires and start mutinies [8], hunger strikes [9] or attempts to commit suicide [10]. Family members of the prisoners also protested in front of the Prison de Bordeaux on June 13. But it should be the whole population of Quebec who should be, for one, requesting to be informed of what is currently going on in the confined institutions when Quebec is reopening, and, secondly, demand an inquiry to find out how the health crisis was really managed since March [11], as was done for the CHLSD and RPA [12]. It must also be determined whether sufficient means are provided in Quebec to really protect the rights and freedoms that confined people still have, in particular the right to health, security, dignity and life. Most of the measures, such as prisoners being forbidden to take walks, if not go on the balcony for psychiatry patients, were put in place because of a dire lack of personnel and resources. In the Fall of 2019, the Protectrice du Citoyen had warned of the continued use of isolation in non-pandemic times of over fifteen days in the prisons in Quebec [13]. Also, youths in detention often have little equipment to entertain themselves or to maintain contact with their family.

In Quebec as elsewhere, Covid-19 therefore brings up the additional issue of knowing whether we wish to also draw rainbows, and at any time, for people who are locked up in confined institutions: anybody may one day have to deal with this, for themself or for someone close.