PRIVATE hospitals conjure up images of fluffy bathrobes, Sky television and a fully stocked minibar.

And private prisons? You might think “I wouldn’t want to go there anyway”, but did you really want to go to hospital?

Being shacked up in prison sounds like sharing a bedsit in some places. Nursing Times (July 10) reports that two adults sometimes share a cell built for one, which means sharing the lavatory and sometimes putting up with a roomie who smokes.

To make matters worse, some private companies that provide prison healthcare are not registered with the Healthcare Commission. While it doesn’t mean private prisons are not up to scratch, it does mean they are not answering to the same checks that govern NHS healthcare providers.

And in a climate where our prisons are bulging at the seams, the Government is increasingly using private institutions to manage the overspill.

Eleven prisons and young offender institutions are now run by private companies. Half of the new 8,000 prison places promised by the Government last year are expected to be provided privately.

“At present private prisons are specifically excluded from the Department of Health regulations, so from a private healthcare perspective the Healthcare Commission has no role in the private prison sector,” says a commission spokesman.

But the Royal College of Nursing prison adviser, Ann Norman, says that the commission “can assist in setting good standards and then measuring against them”.

“We cannot have different clinical standards in private and public sectors.”

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