Written question asked by Lord Garnier (Conservative) on Friday, 19 October 2007, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Tuesday, 23 October 2007. It was answered by Lord Hanson of Flint (Labour) on Thursday, 25 October 2007 on behalf of the Ministry of Justice.

Prisons: Infectious Diseases

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many cases of (a) influenza, (b) Legionnaires' disease, (c) MRSA, (d) dysentery, (e) tuberculosis and (f) Clostridium difficile there were within prisons in England and Wales in each year since 2000.

Answer: The information requested is not held centrally.The Prison Service's Performance Standard, Health Services for Prisoners (May 2004), requires every prison establishment to have in place effective arrangements for the prevention, control and management of communicable diseases. These must include arrangements for the notification of all incidents of notifiable disease, such as tuberculosis, to the local Health Protection Agency's Consultant in Communicable Disease Control (CCDC) and an action plan in the event of an outbreak of a communicable disease.Upon the detection of any infection in a prison establishment, appropriate health care and infection control procedures should be instituted in partnership with infection control teams in primary care trusts and health protection units.

Secondary information