Department of health and Social Care (DHSC): consultation on the health protection regulation amendments
Following a recent review of schedules 1 and 2 of the HPNR regulations, DHSC and UKHSA proposed that 7 infectious diseases could be added to schedule 1 of the regulations.
The addition of the 7 infectious diseases will ensure that they become legally notifiable by the registered medical practitioners to the proper officer of the local authority. These diseases are:
- Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS)
- Influenza of zoonotic origin
- Chickenpox (varicella)
- Congenital syphilis
- Neonatal herpes
- Acute flaccid paralysis or acute flaccid myelitis (AFP or AFM)
- Disseminated gonococcal infection
As part of the review, UKHSA also proposed that 12 causative agents could be added to schedule 2 of the regulations. The addition would make it a statutory duty for all diagnostic laboratories in England to notify UKHSA if they identify any of these causative agents in a human sample. The causative agents proposed to be added are:
- Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV)
- Non-human influenza A subtypes
- Norovirus
- Echinococcus spp
- Tick-borne encephalitis virus (TBEV)
- Toxoplasma (congenital toxoplasmosis)
- Trichinella spp
- Yersinia spp
- Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV)
- Neisseria gonorrhoeae (from a sterile site)
- Treponema pallidum (syphilis)
- Neisseria gonorrhoeae (non-sterile site)
If you are a Microbiology Society member with expertise in any of the diseases and causative agents proposed to be included in schedules 1 and 2 and believe DHSC and UKHSA would benefit from your insight, you can inform the Microbiology Society’s response. For more information, please email f.angwech@microbiologysociety.org by Friday 13 October 2023.
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