is different in therapy wards, where the number of personnel is much higher and where one specialist works, on average with 8–9 prisoners. Periodic difficulties with ensuring a sufficient number of psychologists occur in certain penitentiary establishments, mostly due to long-term sick leaves, maternity or parental leaves, and ongoing recruitment to the positions of psychologists. Each time, in such a situation the director of the establishment, in consultation with the Prison Service regional directors, try to ensure the provision of psychological care to the prisoners, e.g. by temporary employment of psychologists from other establishments; by periodic replacements by psychologists from other wards (e.g. therapeutic wart), or by other replacements. Issues related to the implementation of the standards of operation of penitentiary establishments are subject to official monitoring and are analysed by specialists from the Penitentiary Department of the Prison Service Headquarters, and the Prison Service regional inspection units. The situation of minor detainees in juvenile educational centres during the pandemic40 Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Commissioner has been monitoring the situation of persons deprived of their liberty, detained in any form, imprisoned or placed in a public or private place of detention pursuant to an order of any judicial, administrative or other authority. Such places include, among others, juvenile educational centres (JECs) that are answerable to the Ministry of National Education. In this extremely difficult situation, the directors and staff of the JECs have been under a great pressure to ensure the safety of the young people under their care, despite the increased risk to their physical and mental health in those difficult working conditions. The representatives of the NMPT identified several areas of risk that was connected with the changes in the institution’s operation during the pandemic crisis, and that could compromise the safety of the young people living in the institutions, or even their health and life. Because of to the lack of detailed guidelines regarding quarantine of juveniles in JECs, the directors of the individual institutions developed their own procedures and instructions. The remote visits of the NMPT revealed that the practices in this area were very diverse, and in some cases they were against the juveniles’ rights. In the opinion of the Commissioner, the JECs directors’ attempts to obtain the largest possible numbers of the tests for the juveniles were fully understandable. The JECs are enclosed places where social distancing is not possible. The Commissioner was also concerned with the lack of clear guidelines regarding the organization of quarantine at the centres. The guidelines for their directors, drawn up by the Ministry of Education and Science, contained only general information about the necessity of seven-day quarantine for juveniles newly admitted to the centres. For the quarantine, separate rooms were to be used. In this connection, the JEC directors placed newly arriving juveniles in isolation rooms for sick persons, or established the so-called quarantine groups. The remote monitoring conducted by the NMPT took place 40 General intervention letter of the CHR to the Minister of Education and Science, of 16 November 2020, no. KMP. 573.11.2020. 33