I wish it were true that the prison health care system could care for those they are responsible for. It cannot. I just finished writing a book about an American doctor who only survived his cancers in prison because he knew more than those trying to take care of him, and had lots of outside support to advocate for him. When he was imprisoned at Marion, the federal prison in Southern Illinois, he was the only licensed doctor there. That’s right: The physician who was supposed to take care of him had gone to medical school, but never passed a state exam. This was in the 1980s, but there is little evidence that with our penurious attitude toward the incarcerated that much has changed.