1797.189
. (a) As used in this section:
(1) "Chief medical examiner-coroner" means the chief medical
examiner or the coroner as referred to in subdivision (m) of Section
24000, Section 24010, subdivisions (k), (m), and (n) of Section
24300, subdivisions (k), (m), and (n) of Section 24304, and Sections
27460 to 27530, inclusive, of the Government Code, and Section
102850.
(2) "Prehospital emergency medical care person or personnel" means
any of the following: authorized registered nurse or mobile
intensive care nurse, emergency medical technician-I, emergency
medical technician-II, emergency medical technician-paramedic,
lifeguard, firefighter, or peace officer, as defined or described by
Sections 1797.56, 1797.80, 1797.82, 1797.84, 1797.182, and 1797.183,
respectively, or a physician and surgeon who provides prehospital
emergency medical care or rescue services.
(3) "Reportable disease or condition" or "a disease or condition
listed as reportable" means those diseases specified in Subchapter 1
(commencing with Section 2500) of Chapter 4 of Title 17 of the
California Administrative Code, as may be amended from time to time.
(4) "Exposed" means at risk for contracting a disease, as defined
by regulations of the state department.
(5) "Health facility" means a health facility, as defined in
Section 1250, including a publicly operated facility.
(b) Any prehospital emergency medical care personnel, whether
volunteers, partly paid, or fully paid who have provided emergency
medical or rescue services and have been exposed to a person
afflicted with a disease or condition listed as reportable, that can,
as determined by the county health officer, be transmitted through
oral contact or secretions of the body, including blood, shall be
notified that they have been exposed to the disease and should
contact the county health officer if all of the following conditions
are met:
(1) The prehospital emergency medical care person, who has
rendered emergency medical or rescue services and has been exposed to
a person afflicted with a reportable disease or condition, provides
the chief medical examiner-coroner with his or her name and telephone
number at the time the patient is transferred from that prehospital
medical care person to the chief medical examiner-coroner; or the
party transporting the person afflicted with the reportable disease
or condition provides that chief medical examiner-coroner with the
name and telephone number of the prehospital emergency medical care
person who provided the emergency medical or rescue services.
(2) The chief medical examiner-coroner reports the name and
telephone number of the prehospital emergency medical care person to
the county health officer upon determining that the person to whom
the prehospital emergency medical care person provided the emergency
medical or rescue services is diagnosed as being afflicted with a
reportable disease or condition.
(c) The county health officer shall immediately notify the
prehospital emergency medical care person who has provided emergency
medical or rescue services and has been exposed to a person afflicted
with a disease or condition listed as reportable, that can, as
determined by the county health officer, be transmitted through oral
contact or secretions of the body, including blood, upon receiving
the report from a health facility pursuant to paragraph (1) of
subdivision (b). The county health officer shall not disclose the
name of the patient or other identifying characteristics to the
prehospital emergency medical care person.
Nothing in this section shall be construed to authorize the
further disclosure of confidential medical information by the chief
medical examiner-coroner or any of the prehospital emergency medical
care personnel described in this section except as otherwise
authorized by law.
The chief medical examiner-coroner, or the county health officer
shall notify the funeral director, charged with removing or receiving
the decedent afflicted with a reportable disease or condition from
the chief medical examiner-coroner, of the reportable disease prior
to the release of the decedent from the chief medical
examiner-coroner to the funeral director.
Notwithstanding Section 1798.206, violation of this section is not
a misdemeanor.