While 
many 
Americans 
are 

following the urging of the Centers 

for Disease Control and Prevention 

to practice social distancing due to 

the COVID-19 outbreak, those in 

prisons are often unable to comply 

with this recommendation.

 Nora Krinitsky, interim director 

of the Prison Creative Arts Project 

and director of the University of 

Michigan Carceral State Project, 

said one of the reasons the risk of 

contracting COVID-19 is so great for 

incarcerated individuals is due to 

their close quarters. Krinitsky cited 

an example of overcrowding in the 

Women’s Huron Valley Correctional 

Facility in Ypsilanti, which is the 

only women’s correctional facility 

in the state of Michigan. The facility 

currently houses more than 2,200 

women but was built to house a 

capacity of only 1,100 inmates.

 “If people are within proximity 

with one another and have the 

virus, the spread of it goes up 

exponentially,” 
Krinitsky 
said. 

“That 
is 
what 
people 
inside 

are facing because they cannot 

successfully 
socially 
distance 

(from) one another. So that means 

that we could see people become 

infected and ill, potentially almost 

wholesale, within a prison very 

quickly, meaning in a number of 

days.”

 Krinitsky said many people 

develop 
underlying 
conditions 

while incarcerated due to the 

stressful 
environment 
and 

commonly inadequate health care. 

These conditions have been cited 

by the CDC to increase one’s chance 

of contracting the virus and could 

make fighting it off much more 

difficult.

 
“Healthcare 
in 
prisons 
is 

sometimes difficult to access and 

sometimes non-existent,” Krinitsky 

said. “It’s already the case that 

people who are inside or people 

who come home from prison often 

have really acute medical conditions 

or chronic conditions that they’re 

dealing with that have either been 

caused by their incarceration or 

exacerbated by their incarceration.”

 
Chris 
Gautz, 
Michigan 

Department 
of 
Corrections 

spokesperson, said the MDC is 

taking 
drastic 
precautions 
to 

reduce the likelihood of the spread 

of the virus inside their facilities. 

Gautz spoke of precautions for 

social distancing, such as reducing 

General Educational Development 

and substance abuse class sizes and 

reducing the number of inmates 

in the dining hall during meal 

times. As of March 30, 80 currently 

incarcerated people have tested 

positive in Michigan.

 “We are reducing the class sizes 

that we have for different GED 

classes, substance abuse, other 

types of cognitive programming 

that we do every day,” Gautz said. 

“Typically less than 10 individuals 

in those classes, and we’re having 

them sit further apart while they’re 

in the class. We’re doing the same 

thing for our chow hall so when they 

go out to eat meals, instead of having 

an entire housing unit go out to eat 

together, which could be anywhere 

from 80 to 160 people at a time, we’re 

doing half of that amount.”

michigandaily.com
Ann Arbor, Michigan
Tuesday, March 31, 2020

ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-NINE YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM

Incarcerated individuals face additional 
risks as coronavirus pandemic progresses

Correctional facilities 
are often unable to 
meet recommendations 
for containing outreak

DESIGN BY CARA JHANG

See INCARCERATED, Page 3

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Vol. CXXIX, No. 95
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CAMPUS LIFE

Despite being unable to host 

the event in-person due to the 

coronavirus outbreak, VictorThon 

attendees 
danced 
their 
way 

virtually to raising a preliminary 

sum of more than $280,000 for 

the C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital 

over the weekend. 

VictorThon 
has 
been 
the 

culminating event for Dance 

Marathon at the University of 

Michigan since the organization 

was first established on campus 

23 years ago. 

Virtual event aids C.S. 
Mott Children’s Hospital

U-M Dance 
Marathon 
raises $280K

Students talk impact of social distancing

Shifting to online classes, new CDC guidelines affect mental health, productivity

LSA sophomore Sree Anumolu 

thought staying in her apartment 

in Ann Arbor after classes were 

moved 
online 
would 
be 
fun. 

However, as more of her friends 

started to leave, she decided to 

return home as well. 

Anumolu 
has 
obsessive-

compulsive disorder, which she 

said can affect her productivity 

and well-being. She told The Daily 

having a community and staying 

busy with school helps her to 

manage OCD triggers, but social 

distancing prevents her from using 

socializing as a coping mechanism.

“My OCD has been really bad 

for the past two years, but this 

year started getting a lot better 

because I just talked to my friends 

about it and just tried to actively 

forget about it,” Anumolu said. 

“Trying to get out of the habits 

and being with people helped a lot. 

I remember compared to freshman 

year, I became much more social 

this year because I just knew that 

having a strong circle was what I 

needed to get out of it. For classes, 

I made sure I kept myself busy 

because if I keep myself busy, 

those thoughts don’t come to me.”

Music, 
Theatre 
& 
Dance 

freshman 
Payal 
Parida 
said 

she saw her friends on campus 

every day and the lack of social 

interaction has been the hardest 

part about leaving campus. 

“I had my friends, we would 

spend 24/7 together,” Parida said. 

“I would not go a day without 

seeing them and they were pretty 

much like my second family. So 

having that be completely cut off 

like, so abrupt, was extremely 

hard. You realize how important 

social interaction is and as a human 

being, isolation is so difficult, at 

least for me.”

Christine 
Asidao, 
associate 

director 
of 
community 

engagement 
and 
outreach 
for 

Counseling 
and 
Psychological 

Services, and Todd Sevig, director 

of CAPS, told The Daily in an 

email how CAPS is offering virtual 

and phone appointments to those 

experiencing anxiety due to social 

distancing. 

See DMUM, Page 3

JENNA SITEMAN
Daily Staff Reporter

DESIGN BY CHRISTINE JEGARL

See MENTAL HEALTH, Page 3

JASMIN LEE & 

VARSHA VEDAPUDI

Daily Staff Reporters

CLAIRE HAO & 
IZZI NGUYEN

Daily News Editor & For The Daily