Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM) lawmaker Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu has criticized Turkish authorities for their disregard of inadequate medical care in prisons, pointing to female inmates in central Turkey’s Kayseri Prison who have been suffering from a lack of access to proper treatment.
In a parliamentary speech posted on social media, Gergerlioğlu revealed several human rights violations in prison healthcare. He said some sick inmates were denied treatment even though official records falsely indicated they had received care. Others were not given their prescribed medication, and in one case, an inmate’s hearing device was confiscated.
One sick inmate, who has only one kidney and whose kidney function has dropped to 30 percent, was falsely recorded as having been examined despite not actually receiving a medical examination.
Although inmates submitted complaints to the Kayseri Provincial Health Directorate regarding these violations, they never received a response.
Gergerlioğlu said they had submitted parliamentary questions to the Ministry of Health regarding prison healthcare but received only generic responses claiming that standards were being met. He criticized the ministry’s lack of concern for sick inmates, calling its responses a “joke.”
The denial of medical care and humane conditions to inmates and detainees in Turkey has become a recurring issue, drawing criticism from human rights organizations. Chronic overcrowding, inadequate resources and poor infrastructure in prisons exacerbate the problem, leaving inmates — particularly those with severe illnesses — without access to critical treatment. Despite international standards requiring proper healthcare for prisoners, systemic neglect remains pervasive in Turkey’s penal system.
