Country

Sweden

Detention issue

Healthcare

FRA research findings

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Legal instruments & key provisions

Legal instrument Key provision
Ordinance on Detention Centres (Häktesförordning)Every detention centre and prison must have access to a licensed doctor and trained staff with suitable medical competence.
Prison and Probation Services, Prison and Probation Services' regulations and general advice about prisons (Kriminalvårdens föreskrifter och allmänna råd om fängelse)All Swedish detention centres and prisons have a reception centre for healthcare matters where at least one nurse is present on a daily basis. A doctor should be there one or two times a week. Many centres also have a psychiatrist. If an inmate is prescribed a certain medicine he/she shall have access to that medicine in accordance to the prescription. In case of acute illness or injury, a prisoner should immediately receive medical attention.

NATIONAL PREVENTIVE MECHANISM RECOMMENDATIONS

Year Recommendation Report
2016The NPM noted that the Prison and Probation Services today lacks resources in the form of special healthcare wards in order to receive female inmates with need of specialised care. There is no acceptable reason why female inmates should not have access to the same conditions as male inmates with a need for specialised care. The Prison and Probation Services should actively work to overcome this shortcoming. Report details
2017The NPM recommends that that a prisoner should be examined by a doctor without other persons in the room, even during supervised hospital visits, and that the Prison and Probation Services should prepare planned visits to a hospital in such a way that, if possible, accompanying probation officers don’t have to be present during the examinations. This must be considered to apply also when treatment is to be carried out in other healthcare institutions. The Prison and Probation Services has a very important work ahead when it comes to ensuring that safety and risk assessments become more nuanced and individually adapted. They should take into account the medical conditions of the inmate and the need for the protection of privacy. The Prison and Probation Services should also consider how the authority can ensure that coercive measures in various forms is documented in a satisfactory manner. Report details
2019During the inspection of the prison Västervik Norra, the Parliamentary Ombudsmen’s employees spoke to a detainee who had undergone a medical procedure at the prison. According to the detainee, the procedure was performed without anaesthesia. After the operation, the detainee had suffered bleeding that lasted for an entire night. According to the detainee, he contacted the night staff, but they stated that the officer on duty did not want to transport him to hospital. It was only during unlocking the next morning that the detainee received help. By then there was blood over “the whole cell”, and he was taken to hospital. Recommendation: Due to the details that emerged during the inspection, the Parliamentary Ombudsman decided to open an own-initiative inquiry to investigate the Prison and Probation Service’s treatment of the detainee. Report details
2020During the Parliamentary Ombudsmen’s inspections of remand prisons and prisons, it emerged that the Prison and Probation Service’s healthcare during spring 2020 did not have access to testing equipment so as to test inmates continually for Covid-19 infection. On the other hand, the agency had the so-called capillary test to determine if inmates had antibodies to the virus. Such a test can only be performed after an inmate has shown symptoms for seven days. Parliamentary Ombudsman Katarina Påhlsson emphasised that the safety and security of inmates is dependent on there being a capacity to test for infection and that such tests are also carried out. Recommendation: In the opinion of Parliamentary Ombudsman Katarina Påhlsson, the Prison and Probation Service needs to take immediate measures to ensure that inmates belonging to an at-risk group are given the chance to stay in a department in the security class in which they are usually placed but separate from other inmates who do not belong to an at-risk group. Report details