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Preventable Diseases of Children: Infantile

Quarantine. - All children or other persons exposed to infection from the following diseases should be kept under observation and excluded from schools and other public places during the following period of incubation dated from the latest exposure to such infection: Infantile paralysis (anterior poliomyelitis), 14 days; diphtheria, 8 days; scarlet fever, 8 days; measles, chickenpox, whooping cough and mumps each 14 days. Patients convalescing from any of the above diseases should be isolated for the following periods reckoned from the date of onset or final diagnosis of the disease, namely: Infantile paralysis (anterior poliomyelitis), 28 days; chickenpox, 15 days and thereafter until all scabs have fallen off; diphtheria, 15 days and thereafter until two successive negative cultures have been obtained from the site of the disease secured at least twentyfour hours apart; measles, 21 days and thereafter until all catarrhal symptoms have ceased; mumps, 21 days and thereafter until all glandular swelling has disappeared; scarlet fever, 42 days and thereafter until desquamation (peeling) is complete and all discharges from mucous membranes have stopped; whooping cough, 35 days and thereafter until all spasmodic cough and whooping have ceased.

Children afflicted with ringworms, scabies or impetigo contagiosa should be kept from school and contact with other persons until the disease is cured, or until a reliable physician can certify that they are not liable to spread infection.