Photos: Life in prison The prisons in Malawi are overcrowded, filthy and plagued by disease.

 When Maula prison was first constructed in this east African nation more than 50 years ago, the facility was designed to hold just 800 inmates.
But in the years since then, the prison population has exploded. Today, Maula houses 2,650 inmates — many of them Ethiopian migrants, seemingly detained indefinitely in harsh and unsanitary conditions.
 More pics after cut....

Maula Prison in Lilongwe, Malawi.

As of July 20, there were 193 Ethiopian migrants detained in Maula prison. They were all on their way to South Africa, in search of a better future. They are all detained together in this single cell designed to house no more than 60 people. Although many had finished their sentence weeks earlier, they were still in prison.

Located in Malawi's capital Lilongwe, the prison is plagued by overcrowding, malnutrition, poor sanitation and outbreaks of disease such as scabies, skin infections and viral infections including tuberculosis, hepatitis, malaria and HIV.

Tasfaya Lanago (center, right) said prison conditions are terrible. There is barely enough food, sleeping conditions are poor and there's a general lack of hygiene. 

A prison guard closes the prison's main gate as she shouts to prisoners' relatives that visiting time is over.

A prisoner lies on the ground trying to rest after a night spent awake in an overcrowded cell at the Maula prison.

Maula isn't an isolated case. About 150 miles southeast, in the city of Blantyre, lies Chichiri Prison, another large Malawi prison where inmates face many of the same issues of overcrowding, malnutrition and unsanitary conditions.

Prisoners sit in an overcrowded cell during the night, struggling to sleep.

The prisons are so overcrowded that inmates huddle together on cement floors, with as little as five square feet per person.

Food distribution in Chichiri Prison. Prisoners are fed just once a day, due to the small budget that Malawian Government allocates to the penal system.

Prisoners in the kitchen prepare about 200 pounds of beans and more than a half ton of Nsima — a Malawi staple made from cornmeal paste — each day. But with such severe overcrowding, the food is still just enough to feed prisoners once a day. The nutrition is so poor that, in a single month, Doctors Without Borders "had to treat 18 inmates for moderate to severe malnutrition."

Bowls of Nsima waiting to be served to the prisoners.

Prison guard and workers rest in the prison kitchen after meal time. Every day the prisoners who work in the kitchen cook more than 500 kilos of Nsima and around 100 kilos of beans.

A crackdown on Ethiopian migrants, who are crossing through the country en route to South Africa, has further burdened a prison system already suffering from inadequate resources. In July, almost 200 Ethiopian migrants were held in Maula prison — all of them housed in a single cell designed for no more than 60 people.

A prison officer in his personal quarters inside the workers' compound. The Malawian government doesn't provide much for the prison staff and so MSF also provide for their needs.

A prison officer checks the prisoners in their cell.

Since June, Doctors Without Borders has established a permanent presence in the prison, with medical teams working to help the inmates at risk of contracting deadly infections, such as HIV or TB.

A Doctors Without Borders medical staff member examines a patient. Many detainees in Maula suffer from diseases or general poor health.

Many of the migrant prisoners have remained detained, even after completing their sentences. At least 160 of the detained Ethiopian migrants in Maula Prison had finished their sentences by mid-June, but remained imprisoned.
But even for those who are released, returning home is not an option.
"We can't go back," one man says. "If we go back to Ethiopia, what could we do there? We can't work anymore. We have become too sick for any kind of work."

A Congolese man sits in his cell as he practices his English in preparation for his final school exam at the Chichiri prison.

The classroom in the female section of the Maula prison. Around 50% of female inmates study at the prison's school during their incarceration.