Living conditions, nutritional status and morbidity in children in prisons and detention centers in Burkina Faso

Abstract

In Burkina Faso, although children are sometimes separated from adults in prisons, they still live in the same conditions of overcrowding, which can reach 180% of the capacity. The aim of our study was to describe living conditions, nutritional status, and morbidity of children in detention centers of Burkina Faso. The objective of this cross-sectional descriptive study is to describe the social and health conditions of children held in 20 detention centers in Burkina Faso. During the study period, 109 children, with a mean age of 16.3 years, were examined in 20 correction centers. The main reason for incarceration was theft (66% cases, n = 72). Detention exceeded more than one month for 76 children (70%), and 59% (N = 46) had had fewer than one visit per month since their incarceration. Of these 20 facilities, 6 had no separate quarters for children. The main symptoms and diseases encountered in these children were fever in 19% of the cases (N = 16), macroscopic hematuria in 13% (N = 11), urinary tract infection in 12% (N = 10) and diarrhea in 12% (N = 10). These results show that there is a need to take preventive measures to protect these children's health, especially by improving the quality of living conditions in detention center.