CHAPTER 53.
BOARDS OF HEALTH.
AN ACT to amend Chapter 25 of the Revised Code of the State of Delaware, being an Act relating to the State Board of Health of Delaware Relative to Reporting Diseases Dangerous to Public Health.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the State of Delaware in General Assembly met:
Section 1. That Chapter 25 of the Revised Code of the State of Delaware be and the same is hereby amended by adding thereto the following section, to be styled as "740A. Section 5A":
740A. Section 5A. That syphilis, gonorrhea and chancroid hereinafter designated as venereal diseases are hereby declared to be contagious, infectious, communicable and dangerous to the public health. It shall be unlawful for anyone infected with these diseases or any of them to expose another person to infection.
Section 2. Any physician or other person who makes a diagnosis in or treats a case of venereal disease, and any superintendent or manager of -a hospital, dispensary, or charitable or penal institution in which there is a case of venereal disease, shall make a report of such case to the health authorities by number without name and address so long as the patient shall obey the rules and regulations of the State Board of Health.
Section 3. State, county and municipal health officers, or their authorized deputies, within their respective jurisdictions are hereby directN1 and empowered, when in their judgment it is necessary to protect the public health, to make examinations of persons reasonably suspected of being infected with venereal disease, and to detain such persons until the results of such examinations are known, to require persons infected with venereal disease to report for treatment to a reputable physician and continue treatment until cured or to submit to treatment provided at public expense until cured, and also, when in their judgment it is necessary to protect the public health, to isolate or quarantine persons infected with venereal disease. It shall be the duty of all local and state health officers to investigate sources of infection of venereal disease, to cooperate with the proper officials whose duty it is to enforce laws directed against prostitution, and otherwise to use every proper means for the repression of prostitution.
Section 4. All persons who shall be confined or imprisoned in any state, county, or city prison, in the state shall be examined for and, if infected, treated for venereal diseases by the health authorities or their deputies. The prison authorities of any state, county, or city prison are directed to make available to the health authorities such portion of any state, county, or city prison as may be necessary for a clinic or hospital wherein all persons who may be confined or imprisoned in any such prison and who are infected with venereal disease, and all such persons who are suffering with venereal disease at the time or the expiration of their terms of imprisonment, and, in case no other suitable place for isolation or quarantine is available, such other persons as may be isolated or quarantined under the provisions of Section 3, shall be isolated and treated at public expenses until cured, or, in lieu of such isolation any of such persons may, in the discretion of the Board of Health, be required to report for treatment to a licensed physician, or submit to treatment provided at public expense as provided in Section 3. Nothing herein contained shall be construed to interfere with the service of any sentence imposed by a court as a punishment for the commission of crime.
Section 5. The State Board of Health is hereby empowered and directed to make such rules and regulations as shall in its judgment be necessary for the carrying out of the provisions of this Act, including rules and regulations providing for the control and treatment of persons isolated or quarantined under the provisions of Section 3, and such other rules and regulations, not in conflict with provisions of this Act, concerning the control of venereal diseases, and concerning the care, treatment and quarantine of .persons infected therewith, as it may from time to time deem advisable. All such rules and regulations so made shall be of force and binding upon all county and municipal health officers and other persons affected by this Act, and shall have the force and effect of law.
Section 6. Any person who shall violate any of the provisions of this Act or any lawful rule or regulation made by the State Board of Health pursuant to the authority herein granted, or who shall fail or refuse to obey any lawful order issued by any state, county or municipal health officer, pursuant to the authority granted in this Act, shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and shall be punished by a fine of not more than $1,000 or by imprisonment for not more than a year or by both such fine and imprisonment.
Section 7. The sum of twenty-five hundred dollars is annually appropriated out of any funds in the State Treasury, not otherwise appropriated, for the expenses of this Act.
Section 8. All laws or parts of law in conflict with the provisions of this Act be and the same are hereby repealed.
Approved March 20, A. D. 1919.