Vol. 568 No. 1
556 Mr. Coveney asked the Minister for Health and Children the number of cases of tuberculosis which have been notified to each health board area since the public health doctors' strike began on 14 April 2003; and the arrangements which have been put in place by each health board to identify, screen and appropriately treat contacts of these cases. [15556/03]
The NDSC receives TB notifications through the national TB surveillance system, NTBSS, on a quarterly basis. TB forms-notifications are initially received by public health departments in each of the health boards-authorities and are collated onto a computerised database system locally and then forwarded to NDSC at the end of the quarter. Under normal circumstances, the NDSC would receive TB notifications, from the local systems, for the second quarter of 2003 – April to June – at end of July 2003 at the earliest.
Health boards have protocols and procedures in place for dealing with cases of infectious diseases such as tuberculosis. Cases must be notified in the first instance by the diagnosing clinician to the relevant health board which in turn notifies the National Disease Surveillance Centre. Any further actions required such as implementation of control measures, contact tracing, surveillance, etc., are then undertaken by the relevant health board and-or the National Disease Surveillance Centre, as appropriate.
The current public health doctors' dispute has hampered the health boards' ability to respond to infectious disease cases. My Department, together with the ERHA and each health board, has put contingency plans in place to enable them to provide an emergency response to infectious disease outbreaks during the course of the strike.
