The first Rikers Island inmate tested positive for coronavirus on Wednesday — hours after a correction officer at the city jail also confirmed they had the deadly illness.
The second case on the island in 24 hours signaled the possibility of an outbreak at the jail, the head of the corrections officers’ union said.
Elias Husamudeen, the president of the Correction Officers Benevolent Association, urged the board of corrections to “implement their contingency plans” after the inmate tested positive.
“This crisis will grow worse with each passing day. Give us the help we need now!” he said in a statement.
Husamudeen called for the city to provide new face masks for correction officers that better protect them from the virus than the paper N95 masks.
The union is also calling for new inmates to not be housed on the island because they could introduce the virus into the population.
Earlier Wednesday, the first city Department of Correction officer tested positive for coronavirus.
The officer works security for the front gate at a jail facility on Rikers Island, said Michael Skelly, a spokesman for the Correction Officers Benevolent Association.
A civilian investigator with the city’s DOC died late Sunday from the coronavirus, marking the city’s first municipal-worker fatality from the illness.