USA: More Elderly in Wisconsin State Prisons

LA CROSSE, Wisconsin (WXOW TV 19 News), August 7, 2006: The number of state prisoners in their senior years has tripled in the last decade. The higher price of keeping that population behind bars has corrections officials looking for alternatives. One idea is placing low risk geriatric prisoners in nursing homes or on house arrest. The Department of Corrections had 165 prisoners older than 60 in 1995. That number grew to nearly 500 in 2005. Health costs for adult prisoners have more than tripled over seven years from $28.5 million in 1998 to about $87.5 million in 2005.