If a staff member working in a hospital is exposed to a patient with Tuberculosis or another Hazard Group 3 or 4 pathogen and is referred to the Occupational Health Service (staff not confirmed as contradicted TB at this stage), would this be reportable to the HSENI under RIDDOR regulations as a dangerous occurrence? ( Would Dangerous Occurrence No. 7 Biological agents-Any accident or incident which resulted or could have resulted in the release 7 or escape of a biological agent likely to cause severe human infection or illness or Dangerous occurrence No.20  Escape of substances "The accidental release or escape of any substance in a quantity sufficient to 21 cause the death, major injury or any other damage to the health of any person" apply in this situation.

Look forward to members thoughts on this issue.

Edited by user 20 April 2018 15:33:45(UTC)  | Reason: delete wording Dangerous occurrence no.19

It all depends on whether there is evidence of infection and that it likely that it is acquired from work.   TB is terrible disease to quantify as it takes so long to culture (grow). 28 days in the first instance. Basic immunological tests like the Heath test confirm exposure but do not necessary show the presence of an active disease: for example if you have had a TB jab it will show up positive. We once had an employee who was apparently positive for TB but there was no evidence that the exposure was work related and when we informed the HSE they said to wait until it was positively identified. After waiting 3 months we gave up and never reported. On the other hand I know of places where there was a failure of safe procedures and an employee ended up working with tissue contain active TB( from a cow) this was reported to the HSE and a s**t storm resulted.    They were not infected just potetially might have been.

As Kate said a minefield