EPIDEMIOLOGICAL PATHOGENS

Illinois General Assembly - Full Text of HB4977

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Full Text of HB4977

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HB4977 - 104th General Assembly

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HB4977 Enrolled
LRB104 20091 BAB 33542 b
1

AN ACT concerning regulation.

2

Be it enacted by the People of the State of Illinois,
3
represented in the General Assembly:

4

Section 5.
The Hospital Licensing Act is amended by
5
changing Sections 3 and 6.23 as follows:

6

(210 ILCS 85/3)
7

Sec. 3.
As used in this Act:
8

(A) "Hospital" means any institution, place, building,
9
buildings on a campus, or agency, public or private, whether
10
organized for profit or not, devoted primarily to the
11
maintenance and operation of facilities for the diagnosis and
12
treatment or care of 2 or more unrelated persons admitted for
13
overnight stay or longer in order to obtain medical, including
14
obstetric, psychiatric and nursing, care of illness, disease,
15
injury, infirmity, or deformity.
16

The term "hospital", without regard to length of stay,
17
shall also include:
18

(a) any facility which is devoted primarily to
19

providing psychiatric and related services and programs
20

for the diagnosis and treatment or care of 2 or more
21

unrelated persons suffering from emotional or nervous
22

diseases;
23

(b) all places where pregnant females are received,

HB4977 Enrolled
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LRB104 20091 BAB 33542 b
1

cared for, or treated during delivery irrespective of the
2

number of patients received; and
3

(c) on and after January 1, 2023, a rural emergency
4

hospital, as that term is defined under subsection
5

(kkk)(2) of Section 1861 of the federal Social Security
6

Act; to provide for the expeditious and timely
7

implementation of this amendatory Act of the 102nd General
8

Assembly, emergency rules to implement the changes made to
9

the definition of "hospital" by this amendatory Act of the
10

102nd General Assembly may be adopted by the Department
11

subject to the provisions of Section 5-45 of the Illinois
12

Administrative Procedure Act.
13

The term "hospital" includes general and specialized
14
hospitals, tuberculosis sanitaria, mental or psychiatric
15
hospitals and sanitaria, and includes maternity homes,
16
lying-in homes, and homes for unwed mothers in which care is
17
given during delivery.
18

The term "hospital" does not include:
19

(1) any person or institution required to be licensed
20

pursuant to the Nursing Home Care Act, the Specialized
21

Mental Health Rehabilitation Act of 2013, the ID/DD
22

Community Care Act, or the MC/DD Act;
23

(2) hospitalization or care facilities maintained by
24

the State or any department or agency thereof, where such
25

department or agency has authority under law to establish
26

and enforce standards for the hospitalization or care

HB4977 Enrolled
- 3 -
LRB104 20091 BAB 33542 b
1

facilities under its management and control;
2

(3) hospitalization or care facilities maintained by
3

the federal government or agencies thereof;
4

(4) hospitalization or care facilities maintained by
5

any university or college established under the laws of
6

this State and supported principally by public funds
7

raised by taxation;
8

(5) any person or facility required to be licensed
9

pursuant to the Substance Use Disorder Act;
10

(6) any facility operated solely by and for persons
11

who rely exclusively upon treatment by spiritual means
12

through prayer, in accordance with the creed or tenets of
13

any well-recognized church or religious denomination;
14

(7) an Alzheimer's disease management center
15

alternative health care model licensed under the
16

Alternative Health Care Delivery Act;
17

(8) any veterinary hospital or clinic operated by a
18

veterinarian or veterinarians licensed under the
19

Veterinary Medicine and Surgery Practice Act of 2004 or
20

maintained by a State-supported or publicly funded
21

university or college; or
22

(9) a psychiatric residential treatment facility
23

certified under the Psychiatric Residential Treatment
24

Facilities (PRTF) Act.
25

(B) "Person" means the State, and any political
26
subdivision or municipal corporation, individual, firm,

HB4977 Enrolled
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LRB104 20091 BAB 33542 b
1
partnership, corporation, company, association, or joint stock
2
association, or the legal successor thereof.
3

(C) "Department" means the Department of Public Health of
4
the State of Illinois.
5

(D) "Director" means the Director of Public Health of the
6
State of Illinois.
7

(D-5) "Pathogens of epidemiological concern" means any
8
infectious agent that has one or more of the following
9
characteristics:
10

(1) a propensity for transmission within health care
11

facilities based on published reports from:
12

(A) the Centers for Disease Control and
13

Prevention; or
14

(B) the Department of Public Health;
15

(2) the occurrence of temporal or geographic clusters
16

of 2 or more patients;
17

(3) antimicrobial resistance implications;
18

(4) association with serious clinical disease or
19

increased morbidity and mortality;
20

(5) a newly discovered or reemerging pathogen; or
21

(6) any other characteristic determined by a state or
22

local health department.

23

(E) "Perinatal" means the period of time between the
24
conception of an infant and the end of the first month after
25
birth.
26

(F) "Federally designated organ procurement agency" means

HB4977 Enrolled
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LRB104 20091 BAB 33542 b
1
the organ procurement agency designated by the Secretary of
2
the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for the
3
service area in which a hospital is located; except that in the
4
case of a hospital located in a county adjacent to Wisconsin
5
which currently contracts with an organ procurement agency
6
located in Wisconsin that is not the organ procurement agency
7
designated by the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services
8
for the service area in which the hospital is located, if the
9
hospital applies for a waiver pursuant to 42 U.S.C.
10
1320b-8(a), it may designate an organ procurement agency
11
located in Wisconsin to be thereafter deemed its federally
12
designated organ procurement agency for the purposes of this
13
Act.
14

(G) "Tissue bank" means any facility or program operating
15
in Illinois that is certified by the American Association of
16
Tissue Banks or the Eye Bank Association of America and is
17
involved in procuring, furnishing, donating, or distributing
18
corneas, bones, or other human tissue for the purpose of
19
injecting, transfusing, or transplanting any of them into the
20
human body. "Tissue bank" does not include a licensed blood
21
bank. For the purposes of this Act, "tissue" does not include
22
organs.
23

(H) "Campus", as this term applies to operations, has the
24
same meaning as the term "campus" as set forth in federal
25
Medicare regulations, 42 CFR 413.65.
26
(Source: P.A. 104-147, eff. 8-1-25.)

HB4977 Enrolled
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LRB104 20091 BAB 33542 b
1

(210 ILCS 85/6.23)
2

Sec. 6.23.
Prevention and control of
pathogens of
3
epidemiological concern

Multidrug-Resistant Organisms
.

4

(a)
Each hospital shall develop and implement
5
comprehensive interventions to prevent and control
pathogens
6
of epidemiological concern

multidrug-resistant organisms
7
(MDROs), including methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus
8
aureus (MRSA), vancomycin-resistant enterococci (VRE), and
9
certain gram-negative bacilli (GNB)
, that take into
10
consideration guidelines of the U.S. Centers for Disease
11
Control and Prevention
or recommendations from (A) the
12
Infectious Disease Society of America, (B) the Society for
13
Healthcare Epidemiology of America, (C) the Association for
14
Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology, and (D)
15
the Pediatric Infectious Disease Society
for the management of
16
multidrug-resistant organisms

MDROs
in
health care

healthcare

17
settings.
The Department may also consider any other credible
18
scientific bodies or organizations in adopting rules and
19
developing policies and findings in relation to the management
20
of multidrug-resistant organisms in health care settings.
The
21
Department shall adopt administrative rules that require
22
hospitals to perform an annual facility-wide infection control
23
risk assessment and enforce hand hygiene and contact
24
precaution requirements.
25

(b) Within 12 months after the effective date of this

HB4977 Enrolled
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LRB104 20091 BAB 33542 b
1
amendatory Act of the 104th General Assembly, each hospital
2
shall adopt a policy for preventing and controlling the
3
transmission of pathogens of epidemiological concern that
4
shall, at a minimum, contain:
5

(1) a facility risk assessment to identify pathogens
6

of epidemiological concern that considers elements such as
7

the probability of occurrence, as determined through
8

surveillance, the potential impact of a pathogen, and
9

measures the hospital has implemented to mitigate the risk
10

to patients, health care workers, and visitors; and
11

(2) appropriate evidence-based procedures and
12

intervention strategies to identify patients carrying
13

pathogens of epidemiological concern and to help prevent
14

patients from transmitting pathogens of epidemiological
15

concern to other patients and health care workers.
16

(c) A hospital that has, through appropriate testing,
17
identified a patient who has a pathogen of epidemiological
18
concern shall report the patient to the United States
19
Department of Health and Human Services or the National
20
Healthcare Safety Network of the United States Centers for
21
Disease Control and Prevention, as required by the Department
22
of Public Health or the United States Centers for Medicare and
23
Medicaid services.
24
(Source: P.A. 95-282, eff. 8-20-07; 95-876, eff. 8-21-08.)

25

(210 ILCS 83/Act rep.)

HB4977 Enrolled
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LRB104 20091 BAB 33542 b
1

Section 10.
The MRSA Screening and Reporting Act is
2
repealed.

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