Editor of the draft deputy Lyudmila Stebenkova explained: "The incidence of tuberculosis, especially its persistent forms, is sharply rising in the world". She said that the disease is mainly spread in the Russian capital by hobos, arrivals from some countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States, as well as ex-convicts. "As a rule, they are unwilling to undergo medical examination and take a course of treatment. They are beggars spreading the infection among Muscovites", she said. The reason is "the vague mechanisms in the federal law for the coercive hospitalization of TB cases".
In this connection, the City Duma parliamentarians propose including in the federal law the article Coercive Hospitalization of Tuberculosis Cases, under which "hospitalization is done in case patients have the bacillary (infectious) form of the disease and reject the proposed treatment on the basis of voluntary informed agreement, or intentionally avoid examination for discovering tuberculosis".
The hospitalization decision is taken by court on place of residence, or location of the medical anti-tuberculosis organization.
According to Stebenkova, over 4,000 cases of tuberculosis were registered in Moscow in 2004, 2,800 of them being Muscovites.
