Tuberculosis control laws--United States, 1993. Recommendations of the Advisory Council for the Elimination of Tuberculosis (ACET)

Abstract

Because of its communicable nature and because there are many state laws specific to the control of tuberculosis (TB), TB is managed differently than other airborne infectious diseases [corrected]. Many of these laws predate the current public health recommendations for the prevention and control of TB. In 1989, CDC published A Strategic Plan for the Elimination of Tuberculosis in the United States that was developed by the Advisory Committee (now Council) for the Elimination of Tuberculosis (ACET). The Plan called for the establishment of a national goal of TB elimination (i.e., achieving a case rate of < 1 per million population) by the year 2010. One of the methods for improving disease containment in the Plan was for the use of quarantine measures for nonadherent patients. The Plan called for revision of state and local laws to "facilitate the cure of persons with infectious tuberculosis". The issue of outdated state TB laws was also identified as a problem in the National Action Plan to Combat Multidrug-resistant Tuberculosis. In response to this issue, CDC conducted a survey of state TB control laws and ACET developed recommendations to address discrepancies between previously published recommendations and guidelines for the control of TB and state TB control laws. In order to address these discrepancies, states updating TB control laws should incorporate current recommendations and guidelines from CDC, ACET, and the American Thoracic Society. State laws should permit policies and practices to be rapidly reviewed and amended as new data becomes available and new recommendations and guidelines are published.