Disposal of bodies of persons dying while suffering from communicable disease

(1) No person having the charge or control of the body of any person who has died while suffering from a communicable disease shall permit or suffer persons to come unnecessarily into contract with, or proximity to, the body.

(2) No person shall, without the sanction in writing of an officer of the Public Health Department of the Government or of the local authority concerned not below the rank of Health or Sanitary Inspector, retain in any premises (elsewhere than in a public (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 officer referred to in sub-section (2), 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 a notified disease, or in any other case in which he considers the immediate disposal of the 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. (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 expenses 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 do so. (a) If any person dies in a hospital or a place of temporary accommodation for the sick while suffering from a notified 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 a burial or burning ground or a crematorium for being 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. Without the permission of the Health Officer, or a Magistrate, no person shall cause or permit to be carried in a public conveyance the dead body of any person who has died while suffering from a communicable disease.