Arguing that the state has shown “deliberate indifference to serious medical needs,” inmates are urging a federal appeals court to uphold a ruling that requires the Florida Department of Corrections to provide costly treatment to prisoners who have been diagnosed with the early stages of hepatitis C.

Attorneys for inmates filed a 58-page brief Friday at the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that said the department has resisted providing the treatment for financial reasons, violating the Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment.