134Orders for tests if incident has occurred

134 Orders for tests if incident has occurred

(1) Subject to subsection (11), the Chief Health Officer may make an order under this section if the Chief Health Officer believes that—

(a) an incident has occurred, while a caregiver or custodian is acting in their capacity as a caregiver or custodian, in which, if any of those involved in the incident were infected with a specified infectious disease, the disease could have been transmitted to any of the other persons involved; and

(b) any of those persons to whom the disease could have been transmitted—

(i) has been counselled by a person of a prescribed class about the risk of transmission of the disease in the particular circumstances and about the medical and social consequences of being infected with the disease; and

(ii) has consented to be tested for that disease; and

(c) any of those persons who, if he or she were infected with the disease, could have transmitted it—

(i) has been offered counselling, irrespective of whether the offer was accepted, and has refused to be tested for the disease; or

(ii) is unconscious or otherwise does not have the capacity to consent to be tested for the disease; and

(d) the making of the order is necessary in the interest of rapid diagnosis and clinical management and, where appropriate, treatment for any of those involved.

(2) An order made under this section—

(a) must be in writing;

(b) must give details of the incident which led to its making;

(c) must name the person to whom it applies;

(d) must name the disease for which the person must be tested, which must be a disease for which another person has agreed to be tested under subsection (1)(b);

(e) must require that the person named in the order give a sample of blood or urine or submit to a sample of blood or urine being taken;

(f) must specify the place where the person named in the order is required to give a sample of blood or urine or submit to a sample of blood or urine being taken;

(g) has effect from the time that it is served on the person named in the order or, if the order is made in respect of a person who is dead, from the time that the order is made.

S. 134(3) amended by No. 37/2014 s. 10(Sch. item 136.3(a)).

(3) If the Chief Health Officer believes that it is necessary to do so to enforce an order made under this section, the Chief Health Officer may apply to the Magistrates' Court for an order to authorise a police officer to use reasonable force to—

(a) take the person named in the order to the place specified in the order; or