The United States has more female prisoners than China, Russia and India combined. According to the International Centre for Prison Studies, the U.S. has 201,200 female prisoners, 8.8 percent of its total prison population. China comes a very distant second with 84,600 female prisoners while Russia is in third place with 59,000. 625,000 women and girls are being held in penal institutions worldwide and the female prison population is rising on all five continents.