In brief speech to county board, CEO of MEDIKO calls adequate care for Shasta’s incarcerated a constitutional right

In March, Sheriff Michael Johnson shared with the board of supervisors his goal of “changing the culture” at the Shasta County Jail. One of the ways he intended to do that, he said, was by entering into a contract with a new medical provider at the county’s death-ridden jail, in hopes of improving the quality of care incarcerated people receive behind bars. 

A side benefit, both he and supervisors acknowledged, would be reducing the cost of litigation related to injuries and death at the aging facility. 

Heeding the sheriff’s words, last month the board approved a new contract with MEDIKO, a Virginia-based correctional health care company. The decision required a hefty additional outlay of funds averaging, supervisors said, $3 million more than the current contract each year. 

Today, MEDIKO’s founder and CEO Dr. Kaveh Ofogh visited Shasta County and spoke to the board — not as an invited presenter but as a public commenter. He was warmly introduced by a beaming Johnson who referred to him as a “self-made man,” someone the sheriff trusts to improve the conditions of the jail. 

Using his allotted three minutes, Ofogh spoke slowly and deliberately, outlining his principles when it comes to providing medical care for the vulnerable. Noting that people incarcerated in county jails typically come from a “lower socioeconomic class” and “suffer from more extensive, underdiagnosed or undiagnosed” mental health and medical conditions, Ofogh offered an impassioned vision for what that care should look like, and why.

“They have the constitutional right to receive high quality care while they are incarcerated,” Ofogh said of those behind bars, adding that those in custody “have someone outside who loves them.”

Speaking to Shasta Scout after the meeting, Ofogh emphasized his belief that medical staff are obligated to “detect serious medical mental health conditions and act on it,” referring to jails as the “urgent care centers of correctional medicine.”

Operations inside the jail have been the subject of community concern for several years, given the facility’s relatively high fatality rate in comparison to similarly sized jails — a number cited by a grand jury report published in 2025. 

Board members approved an amendment to the contract with MEDIKO today, with a new start date of June 1. The jail’s current medical contractor is the private megacompany Wellpath, which will be phased out at the end of May. Nationwide, Wellpath serves 205 local detention facilities. The company has been the subject of wrongful death lawsuits around the country — at times, costing millions of dollars in settlements. Locally, the mother of the deceased Juan Moreno, a 27-year-old who died by suicide at the Shasta County jail in early 2025, filed a lawsuit against the county late last year alleging medical negligence among other claims.

According to the Virginia business registry, MEDIKO was formed in 1996. A news release from the company cited that it serves 25 facilities around the country. Most of those are in the Mid-Atlantic with facilities in Washington state as well as San Benito County. In an interview today after the county board meeting, Ofogh said MEDIKO is “medically and not financially driven,” noting that his company is not owned by a private equity firm, as is increasingly the case with medical facilities around the country. That’s a financial structure that experts say can lead to a decrease in the quality of care for patients. 

While Ofogh declined to weigh in on the operations of Wellpath or other similar companies, he did explain for Shasta Scout how he intends to change standard medical procedures at the jail moving forward. 

Under the new contract, Dr Ofogh said, medical staffing will increase by about 75%. The company intends to double the number of licensed vocational nursing positions from the previous 4 to 8. Additionally, MEDIKO will create two new nursing positions focused on medically assisted treatment for substance use, establish a new nursing position to focus on intake, and add two new mental health positions, a new discharge planner and substance use disorder counselor to help incarcerated people reenter society. All of that costs money, he said, which is the reason MEDIKO’s contract is more expensive than the prior one.

Addressing concerns about how he’ll manage to employ enough medical personnel in a county facing a severe health care provider shortage, Ofogh said keys to retention will include hiring good managers and establishing practical employee guidelines. As far as recruitment, he said, finances are the key.

“It’s not rocket science,” he said. “You have to have to pay them enough money.”

According to job listings on Indeed, some of that recruitment has already begun. MEDIKO plans to pay $51-61 an hour for a full-time registered nurse position.

Ofogh noted that his company “does not respond to every RFP that is available out there,” but said he felt MEDIKO was well suited for Shasta’s needs, given that both the sheriff and the board of supervisors were looking for a medical provider focused on quality. 

“I treat these jails that we have contracted with as my offices, and these incarcerated individuals as my patients,” he said, saying that his approach is consistent regardless of age, ethnicity, or gender preference. 

Tomorrow Ofogh will be touring his newest “office,” the Shasta County Jail. 

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