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2015 SESSION

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15104240D
SENATE BILL NO. 1143 AMENDMENT IN THE NATURE OF A SUBSTITUTE (Proposed by the Senate Committee on Education and Health on February 5, 2015) (Patron Prior to Substitute--Senator Garrett) A BILL to amend and reenact § 32.1-48.08 of the Code of Virginia, relating to the establishment of quarantine zones.

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

1. That § 32.1-48.08 of the Code of Virginia is amended and reenacted as follows:

§ 32.1-48.08. Declaration of quarantine.

A. The State Health Governor, at the request of the Commissioner, may declare a quarantine of any person or persons or any affected area after he finds that the quarantine is the necessary means to contain a communicable disease of public health threat as defined in § 32.1-48.06 to which such person or persons or the people of an affected area have been or may have been exposed and thus may become infected.

B. The State Health Commissioner shall record his findings and any information on which he has relied in making the finding required for quarantine pursuant to subsection A. The State Health Commissioner's record of findings concerning any communicable disease of public health threat shall be confidential and shall not be disclosed in accordance with subdivision 17 of § 2.2-3705.5.

C. The State Health Commissioner may order the quarantined person or persons to remain in their residences, to remain in another place where they are present, or to report to a place or places designated by the State Health Commissioner for the duration of their quarantine. An electronic device may be used to enforce any such quarantine. The Commissioner's order of quarantine shall be for a duration consistent with the known incubation period for such disease or, if the incubation period is unknown, for a period anticipated as being consistent with the incubation period for other similar infectious agents.

D. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the Governor is authorized to establish quarantine zones at any time when an individual enters the Commonwealth where his point of origin is a foreign country in which a communicable disease of public health threat, including the Ebola virus, has caused the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to issue a Level 3 Travel Health Notice. The Governor is authorized to direct the Commissioner to declare a quarantine of any individual arriving from such country who has been exposed or is reasonably believed to have been exposed to such disease. A person held in a quarantine zone pursuant to this subsection shall remain in the quarantine zone for a duration consistent with the known incubation period for such disease or, if the incubation period is unknown, for a period anticipated as being consistent with the incubation period for other similar infectious agents.