Chap. 612.—An ACT to amend and re-enact sections 1714, 1715, 1717, 1724, and
1725, code of Virginia, in relation to the powers, duties, and compensation of
the state board of health, and to make an appropriation for maintaining the

same.
Approved March 3, 1896.

1. Be it enacted by the general assembly of Virginia, That sec-
tions one thousand seven hundred and fourteen, one thousand seven
hundred and fifteen, one thousand seven hundred and seventeen, one
thousand seven hundred and twenty-four, and one thousand seven
hundred and twenty-five of the code of Virginia, be amended and
re-enacted so as to read as follows:

§ 1714. State board of health; how constituted and appointed;
term of office.—The governor shall appoint seven physicians, three
from the city of Richmond, and the other four from different sec-
tions of the state, who shall constitute the state board of health and
vital statistics. The physicians so appointed shall hold their office
four years, and until their successors are appointed, and all the va-
cancies in the board shall be filled by the governor.

§ 1715. Their duties, powers and annual reports.—The state board
of health shall place themselves in communication with the loca!
boards of health, the hospitals, asylums, and public institutions
throughout the state, and shall take cognizance of the interests of
health and life among the citizens generally. They shall make
sanitary investigations, and inquiries respecting the causes of dis-
ease, especially of epidemic and endemics, the sources of mortality
among the white persons and the colored persons, and the effects of
localities, employments, conditions, and circumstances on the pub-
lic health; and they shall gather such information in respect to
these matters as they may deem proper for diffusion among the
people. They shall devise some scheme whereby medical and vital
statistics of sanitary value may be obtained, and act as an advisory
board to the state in all hygienic and medical matters, especially
such as relate to the location, construction, sewerage, and adminie-
tration of prisons, hospitals, asylums and other public institutions.
They shall have power and authority as hereafter directed to adopt
such rules and regulations, and issue such orders as may be neces-
sary to prevent the spread of contagious or infectious diseases, and
to confine persons infected therewith or who may have recently been
exposed to the same, within prescribed limits. They shall, at each
regular session of the general assembly, make a report of their
doings, investigations and discoveries, with such suggestions, as to
the legislative action required, as they may deem proper.

§ 1717. Meetings of board; president and secretary ; quorum; their
compensation.—The board shall meet at the capitol of the state at
least once in every three months, and oftener if they deem necessary.
Three members shall constitute a quorum. They shal! elect from
their own number a president and permanent secretary. The latter
shall reside at the capital, and shall be their executive officer. The
salary of the secretary shall be fixed by the board. The other mem-
bers of the board shall receive no salary, but shall be paid the sum
f four dollars per day while engaged in the discharge of their duties,
nd their traveling expenses incurred while so employed. The ex-
yenses of the state board of health, which shall not in any one year
xceed the sum of two thousand dollars, shall be paid by warrants
lrawn on the auditor of public accounts, signed by the president of
aid board, and countersigned by the secretary, out of any money in
he treasury not otherwise appropriated.

§ 1724. Duties of the state board of health and of justices when
imall-pox, and so forth, is suspected.—If any member of the state
poard of health or a justice of any county shall have complaint, on
sath, made to him, or if he shall have reason to think that there is
on any lot, tenement, or plantation, or on board any vessel in said
county, any person infected with small-pox, or other dangerous dis-
ease, 1f shall be the duty of said member of the board of health, or
of said justice to issue a mandate in writing, addressed to two physi-
cians of said county, requiring them to goto the place so suspected
and to examine the persons diseased, if any, and to report in writing
their opinion of such disease, and whether the public’s interests re-
quire any action. If it appear to said board of health or said justice
from said report that such person or persons are infected with small-
pox or other dangerous disease, then said board of health or justice,
whichever has first taken cognizance of the case, shal! prescribe such
rules and regulations as may be deemed necessary to prevent the
spread of such disease; but the action of said justice shall be sub-
ject tothe review of the local board of health, and for this purpose
said board of health or justice may establish a quarantine at the
place or places where such disease exists, and inhibit any ingress or
egress to or from the same. They may, by proper orders, prevent any
railroad train, steamboat or other conveyance from taking on or put-
ting off passengers or freight at any point or points in or near the
infected district. For the services required of the physicians under
this section, a reasonable allowance shall be made to them by the
board of supervisors at the next county levy thereafter.

§ 1725. Removal of persons infected to hospital.—The council or
health officer of a city or town, or any two justices of a county or the
state board of health, may cause any person in said city, town or
county infected with any contagious or infectious disease, dangerous
to the public health, to be removed to a hospital or other place for
the reception of the infected, unless such person be sick in his own
place of residence, or cannot be moved without danger to his life.

2. This act shall be ip force from its passage.