July 21, 2020.
The COVID-19 pandemic has drawn attention to the need for governments in the Americas to take initiatives against prison overcrowding, given the high risks of a deadly outbreak in places of detention where social distancing and other sanitary measures are difficult to implement. In this context, some governments have taken alternative measures to imprisonment such as house arrest— which is a court order for the arrest of the person at his place of residence — to reduce overcrowding.