Hill County Board of Health to discuss quarantine procedure in the wake of HB 702

The Hill County Board of Health has called a special meeting to be held at 1:30 p.m. Wednesday in the Hill County Courthouse Annex meeting room to discuss how Montana House Bill 702 affects the county’s quarantine policies.

HB 702 prohibits discrimination based on vaccine status or possession of an immunity passport, defined as any physical or electronic record of whether a person is immune to any disease through vaccination or infection and recovery.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance states that people need to quarantine for 14 days if they’ve been in close contact — within six feet of someone for a cumulative total of 15 minutes or more over a 24-hour period — with someone who has COVID-19, unless they’ve been fully vaccinated.

People who are fully vaccinated do not need to quarantine after contact with someone who had COVID-19 unless they have symptoms, the CDC’s website says, but should get tested three to five days after their exposure, even if they don’t have symptoms and wear a mask indoors in public for 14 days following exposure or until their test result is negative.

HB 702 states that it is an unlawful discriminatory practice for a person or a governmental entity to refuse, withhold from, or deny to a person any local or state services, goods, facilities, advantages, privileges, licensing, educational opportunities, health care access, or employment opportunities based on the person’s vaccination status or whether the person has an immunity passport.

It also prohibits an employer from refusing employment to a person, to bar a person from employment, or to discriminate against a person in compensation or in a term, condition, or privilege of employment based on this basis.

The act also states it’s unlawful to create a public accommodation to exclude, limit, segregate, refuse to serve, or otherwise discriminate against a person based on vaccination status or the possession of an immunity passport as well.

The law does not apply to school vaccination requirements, and health care facilities are permitted to take measures to protect staff, patients and visitors from disease should an employee volunteer the fact that they are unvaccinated or choose not to disclose their vaccination status, in which case facility leadership is permitted to assume that person is unvaccinated.

It also permits licensed nursing homes, long-term care facilities, or assisted-living facilities to be exempt during any period of time in which compliance with it would result in a violation of regulations or guidance issued by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid services or CDC.

Wednesday’s meeting is scheduled to last for one hour.