Social Policy Minister John Dalli told Parliament that the Department for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention has in place arrangements for when immigrants suffering from tuberculosis are about to be released from detention centres.

Such immigrants are put into contact with a social worker or community worker in the open centre where they are going to be placed. The social or community worker is responsible to see that the immigrants take their medicines regularly. The department sees fortnightly documentation on whether or not this is being done. When there is a problem, the social or community worker immediately informs the department, which investigates.

In the case of other infectious diseases, if the consultant sees that an immigrant is not taking his prescribed medicines, or is not attending for check-ups as programmed, he contacts the department to launch further investigations.

The Health Promotion and Disease Prevention Department recommends that persons working at detention centres should be vaccinated against tuberculosis, Hepatitis B and other infectious diseases such as polio and tetanus. There is no vaccination against HIV.

Mr Dalli was answering a parliamentary question by Silvio Parnis (PL).