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State: Calif. Young: More on Workers' Comp COVID Presumption: [2020-04-29] |
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A second bill to enact a presumption that COVID illness is industrial has been introduced in California’s legislature. The bill, SB 1159 (authored by Sen. Jerry Hill and co-authored by Assemblyman Tom Daly), would create a rebuttable presumption that for certain “critical workers,” COVID illness or death be deemed industrial. This would apply to critical workers who directly interact with the public during the pandemic. SB 1159 is clearly a work in progress and will go through further revisions. At the moment it competes with AB 664 which would create a presumption that COVID is industrial for police, fire and certain healthcare workers. SB 1159 defines “critical worker” as “a public sector or private sector employee who is employed to combat the spread of COVID-19. It is the intent of the Legislature that this group of workers be explicitly identified in order to ensure that they receive all necessary health care through the workers’ compensation system.” This definition does not appear to cover “essential workers'” such as grocery employees, truckers, delivery people, and transit drivers, as they are not employed to combat the spread of the virus. Also, public safety or hospital/clinic workers who do not interact with the public would not be covered under SB 1159. The current version of SB 1159 contains an undefined sunset provision and a requirement for an undefined amount of lost work time. My last post, “To Presume or Not Presume, That is the Question”, discussed the recent WCIRB report on the projected costs of a COVID presumption: In that post, I noted what appeared to me as a rather large discrepancy in cost projections between the WCIRB’s report and those of the State Compensation Insurance Fund. SCIF has announced that they are accepting diagnostically confirmed COVID claims of essential workers during the period of the stay at home order as industrial. SCIF’s press release noted projections of a total of $205 million in costs for this, significantly lower than the huge cost projections tallied by the the WCIRB. Following my post, SCIF President Vern Steiner reached out to me, offering a clarification on SCIF’s thinking on the matter. Here is Steiner’s explanation:
Steiner closed by noting that: “From my point of view as soon as the shelter-in-place orders started differentiating exposure for essential workers and the general population I believed that these claims would be compensable unless there was evidence that the exposure came from a non-work related source. I hope the rest of the insurance and self-insured community see this as well.” Readers should stay tuned. I’ll be covering the effect of COVID on California workers’ comp, and watching to see how discussions of a COVID presumption develop. Here is a link to SB 1159: http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200SB1159 And here is a link to AB 664: http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200AB664 Julius Young is a claimants' attorney for the Boxer & Gerson law firm in Oakland. This column was reprinted with his permission from his blog, www.workerscompzone.com. |