New South Wales Consolidated Acts

PUBLIC HEALTH ACT 2010 - SECT 87

87 Responsibilities of principals of child care facilities with respect to immunisation

(1) Certificates for immunisation or exemption must be provided before enrolment The principal of a child care facility must not enrol a child, or permit a child to enrol, at the child care facility unless the parent of the child, or the principal of another child care facility, has provided to the principal--

(a) a vaccination certificate and, if the vaccination certificate does not cover some of the vaccine preventable diseases for which immunisation at the child's age is recommended by the NSW Immunisation Schedule, a medical certificate in respect of any vaccine preventable disease not covered by the vaccination certificate, or

(b) if a vaccination certificate is not provided--a medical certificate in respect of the vaccine preventable diseases for which immunisation at the child's age is recommended by the NSW Immunisation Schedule.

: Maximum penalty--50 penalty units.

(2) A person must not forge or falsify a certificate that is required to be provided under this section.

: Maximum penalty--50 penalty units.

(3) Exemptions from pre-enrolment requirement A principal of a child care facility is not required to comply with subsection (1) before enrolling, or permitting the enrolment of, a child at the child care facility in the circumstances prescribed by the regulations for the purposes of this section.

(4) Other occasions when certificates may be required The principal of a child care facility must, on such occasions as may be prescribed by the regulations, ask a parent of a child enrolled at the child care facility to provide for that child an updated certificate of a kind required to be provided under subsection (1).

(5) Immunisation register The principal of a child care facility must keep an immunisation register, in the approved form, containing the following--

(a) a record of the immunisation status of each child enrolled at the child care facility,

(b) immunisation certificates and other certificates provided to the principal under this section.

(6) The principal of a child care facility must retain information about a child in the immunisation register for such period as may be prescribed by the regulations and must produce the register for inspection on request by the public health officer.

: Maximum penalty--50 penalty units.

(7) Provision of certificates for enrolment at other child care facilities The principal of a child care facility at which a child is currently or was previously enrolled must, on request, provide a copy of the record and certificates kept for that child in the immunisation register of the child care facility to--

(a) the parent of the child, for the purpose of the enrolment of the child at another child care facility, or

(b) the principal of another child care facility at which the child proposes to enrol.

(8) Chief Health Officer may issue guidelines The Chief Health Officer may publish guidelines on the website of the Ministry of Health to assist authorised practitioners who are requested to provide certificates under this section.

(9) In this section--

"medical certificate" means a certificate in the approved form by an authorised practitioner certifying that a specified child should have an exemption for one or more vaccines for specified vaccine preventable diseases due to a medical contraindication to vaccination.

"vaccination certificate" means--

(a) an immunisation certificate indicating that the child is age appropriately immunised, or

(b) a certificate in the approved form by an authorised practitioner certifying that the child is following an approved vaccination catch-up schedule.