(1) No person having the charge or control of the body of any person who has died while suffering from an infectious disease shall permit or suffer persons to come unnecessarily into contact with, or proximity to the body.
(2) No person shall, without the sanction in writing of the Health Officer or of a person authorised by him in this behalf, retain in any premises (elsewhere than in a public mortuary) for more than twelve hours the body of any person who has died while suffering from an infectious disease.
(3) (a) If any such body (not being a body kept in a mortuary) remains undisposed of for more than twelve hours without the sanction referred to in sub-section (2), or if the dead body of any person is retained in any building so as to endanger the health of the inmates of such building, or of any adjoining or neighbouring building, any Magistrate may, on the application of any Health Officer or of a person authorized by him in this behalf order the body to be removed and disposed of within a specified time.
(b) A Magistrate may, in the case of the body of a person who has died while suffering from an infectious disease or in any other case in which he considers the immediate disposal of the dead body necessary, direct the body to be so disposed of, unless the friends or the relatives of the deceased undertake the disposal of the body within a time specified in the order.
Prohibition of use of public library by infected persons.
Disposal of bodies of persons dying from infectious disease.
[Act No.XII of 1950] 13
(c) The expenses of the removal and disposal of any body under clause (a) or clause (b) shall be borne by the local authority, but such expense may be recovered, as if it were a tax due to it, by the local authority from any person who would have been legally liable therefor but for such removal and disposal unless in the opinion of the local authority he is too poor to admit of the recovery of such expense.
(4) (a) If any person dies in a hospital or a place of temporary accommodation for the sick while suffering from an infectious disease and the Health Officer certifies that in his opinion it is desirable, in order to prevent the spread of infection, that the body should not be removed from such hospital or place except for the purpose of being taken direct to burial or burning ground or a crematorium for being forthwith buried or cremated, no person shall remove the body from the hospital or place except for such a purpose.
(b) When the body is removed for the purpose aforesaid it shall forthwith be taken direct to a burial or burning-ground or a crematorium, and there buried or cremated with the least practicable delay.
(5) Without the permission of the Health Officer no person shall cause or permit to be carried in a public conveyance the dead body of any person who had died while suffering from an infectious disease.