PETITION OF:

SECTION 1. Section 26 of chapter 31 of the General Laws, as appearing in the 2000 Official Edition, is hereby amended by striking out, in line eight-seven, the words "and ninety-four B" and inserting in place thereof the following words:— ninety- four B and ninety-four C.

SECTION 2. Section 1 of Chapter 32 of the General Laws, as appearing in the 1992 Official Edition, is hereby amended by including after the words "permanent employees", in line 242, the following:— For the purposes of the presumption provided in Section 94C of this chapter, "employees" shall include and mean, but not be limited to, the following:— uniformed members of paid fire departments and permanent members of police departments, members of the police force of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority or the Department of State Police, corrections officers and personnel whose regular or incidental duties require the care, supervision, or custody of prisoners, crash crewmen, crash boatmen, fire controlmen and assistant fire controlmen at the General Edward Lawrence Logan International Airport, emergency medical technicians, paramedics, physicians, assistant physicians, dentists, dental assistants and hygienists, nurses, nurse practitioners, unlicensed nurse assistants and technicians, social workers, employees of clinical and/or diagnostic laboratories, employees of facilities for the disabled or mentally ill, or any other public safety officials or public health care professionals whose regular, incidental, or assigned duties to protect the health and safety of the public may lead to or involve an occupational exposure to blood or other infectious material.

SECTION 3. Chapter 32 of the General Laws is hereby amended by inserting after section ninety-four B, as so appearing, the following section:—

Section 94C. (1) Notwithstanding the provisions of any general or special law to the contrary, any condition of hepatitis B, human immunodeficiency virus and tuberculosis, resulting in total disability or death to an employee, as defined in Section 1 of this chapter, shall be presumed to have been suffered in the line of duty, unless it is shown by a preponderance of the evidence that non-service connected risk factors or non-service connected accidents or hazards undergone, or any combination thereof, caused such incapacity; provided, however, that the appointing authority of the commonwealth or one of its political subdivisions may require any new hire to be tested for such infectious disease in order to be eligible for the benefit provided by this section. If such new hire refuses to be tested, said new hire shall be ineligible for the benefit provided by this section; provided, further, that such testing shall be conducted in accordance with Section 70F of Chapter 111 of the General Laws. The provisions of this section shall only apply if the disabling or fatal condition is a type of infectious disease which may, in general, result from occupational exposure to blood and other body fluids or to infectious tuberculosis. If the appointing authority provides an inoculation, which has been approved by the commissioner of public health, which may prevent the acquiring of an infectious disease defined by this section and the employee refuses to receive such inoculation said employee shall be ineligible for the benefit provided by this section.

(2) The provisions of this section shall not apply to any personserving in such position for fewer than six months at the time that such condition is first discovered, or should have been discovered.

Any person first discovering any such condition within six months of the last date on which such person actively so served shall be eligible to apply for benefits hereunder, and such benefits, if granted, shall be payable as of the date on which the employee last received regular compensation. The provisions of this section shall not apply to any person serving in such position unless such person shall first establish that he has responded to a call where he may have been exposed.

(3) The provisions of this section shall also apply to other infectious diseases, other than those listed in subdivision (1), which, in general, may result from an occupational exposure, as determined by the commissioner of the department of public health and designated by regulation with the provisions provided in section one of this chapter.

(4) Nothing herein shall preclude a member from applying for and receiving benefits under section seven or section nine, subject to the provisions of said sections.

(5) The appointing authority may require employees who have been exposed to blood or other infectious material to file an incident report with the appointing authority detailing the possible exposure.

SECTION 4. Section 100 of said chapter 32, as so appearing, is hereby amended by striking out, in line eighty-one, the words "and ninety-four B" and inserting in place thereof the following words:— ninety-four B and ninety-four C.

SECTION 5. The provisions of this act shall apply only to a person actively employed, as provided in Section 1 of Chapter 32, on or after the effective date of this act.

SECTION 6. The provisions of section three shall not be construed to affect the interpretation of the provisions of said sections ninety-four, ninety-four A or ninety-four B of chapter thirty-two of the General Laws.

SECTION 7. The provisions of this act shall be effective in every retirement system established by or operating under the provisions of chapter thirty-two of the General Laws or under the similar provisions of any other general or special law, and for every governmental unit which is a member of such retirement system, notwithstanding the provisions of section twenty-seven C of the General Laws.