Report on the Performance of the Activities of the National Preventive Mechanism for 2019 1. PERSONS IN DETENTION AND THE PERFORMANCE OF THE NATIONAL PREVENTIVE MECHANISM 1.1. THE PRISON SYSTEM During 2019, we acted in a total of 203 cases, issuing 35 warnings, recommendations and suggestions. In 25 cases, where directly establishing the facts and circumstances was necessary to determine whether the complaints were founded, we conducted field investigations. As in previous 4 years, the most frequent cause for complaint was healthcare, followed by accommodation conditions, prison officers’ conduct and use of privileges. Prisoners frequently turn to us due to the ineffectiveness of legal remedies, as well as with requests for help getting transferred, while there have also been many complaints involving problems in multiple areas. In 2019, the same reasons for complaints regarding medical care that we have written more extensively in previous reports have continued to come our way. There is less and less dissatisfaction over failing to get referrals, or waiting too long to be examined by the prison doctor, while there has been a rise in the number of complaints over not getting referral for specialist examination, or over specialists' recommendations not being followed through. There are similar reasons for complaints over the accommodation conditions in individual places of detention, for instance, failing to observe the legal standard of 4 sq m, for instance, in the Lepoglava State Prison and Sisak County Prison; unsuitable means of transporting prisoners – old specialised vehicles with bench seats along the sides of the vehicle, not fitted with safety belts (for instance, in the Split County Prison); and not separating smokers from non-smokers, for instance in the Bjelovar County Prison and Lepoglava State Prison. A trend observed in 2018 has continued, with prisoners no longer complaining about the lack of treatment officers, except in special cases, but about the actions they undertake after interviews with