It is often ignored that imprisoning women has greater social cost to family and community than does imprisoning most men prisoners. Family breakdown, long-term problems among children taken into care and a loss of community spirit and cohesion can push the social costs of women’s imprisonment considerably higher than for men’s imprisonment. This is a background paper for the Kyiv Declaration on Women’s Health in Prison, which was discussed and adopted during the WHO International Conference on Prison Health in November 2008. The paper reflects the evidence from literature research and the best evidence provided by experts on.
