The Director of Public Health has instructed all government and private healthcare institutions and laboratories to notify tuberculosis when it is diagnosed.
As per the Tamil Nadu Public Health Act, 1939, under Section 62, TB was declared a notified disease by the State on January 19, 1955. Thus all practitioners who diagnose or treat the disease must provide information “with the least practicable delay” to the concerned local health authority. Not doing so could invite penalty under Section 134 (1) of the Act, he said.
All deputy directors of health services, health officers in corporations and municipalities and city health officers, have been told to “promptly report incidence of cases on a daily basis from all healthcare providers, laboratories with diagnostic facilities for TB, pharmacies dispensing anti-TB drugs, government and private hospitals”.
The directors of medical education and medical services have also been requested to issue suitable instructions to their subordinate officers in this regard.
