As I stated on a previous blog, the Illinois Workers Compensation Commission recently issued the first decision on a work comp claim related to Covid. First, some background and then I provide keys factors to increase your chances of winning your claim.
On June 5, 2020, the Illinois Legislature amended the Occupational Disease Act to provide benefits to “first responders and frontline workers” who contract Covid. Frontline workers means those people working for an essential businesses where they are exposed to the general public or work in locations with more than 15 people.
The law allows frontline workers who contract Covid, to presume that they contracted Covid at work.
This is important because in order to collect workers compensation benefits for contracting Covid, you must first prove you contracted Covid at work. This law essentially allows judges to agree that frontline workers contracted Covid at work without having to prove they did.
HOWEVER, the law also allows employers to refute that assumption, if they could provide “SOME” evidence that the worker’s job was not the cause of Covid. “Some” evidence appears to be a fairly easy criteria to meet. If the employer presents “some” evidence, than the frontline worker loses the benefit of “assuming” Covid came from work.
That, although, does not mean the frontline worker has lost the case, it just means it’s a little harder to get workers compensation benefits. Rather than assuming the worker contracted Covid at work, they must now prove, like any other worker, by a “preponderance of evidence” Covid came from work. “Preponderance of evidence” means that you have to persuade the judge that there is a greater than 50% chance that you contracted Covid from work.
In determining whether the worker contracted Covid from work or not, the judge focuses on three factors:
1. What did the employer do to protect its workers from Covid?
2. Were the actions, habits and customs of the worker the type that would indicate he contracted Covid elsewhere?
3. Was the worker at work in the days or weeks prior to contracting Covid?
In other words, if a worker wants to increase his chances of persuading a judge that he did in fact contract Covid at work he must try to prove the following:
1. Show that your employer failed to protect its workers, implement preventive Covid protocols, and enforce social distancing or anything else similar.
2. Show that your travels were limited to work, that you were isolated from people or that those that live with you were also limited in their travels.
3. Show that you were at work prior to getting Covid.
These guideline obviously should not substitute the legal experience of an attorney, but they at least serve as some guidelines for what type of evidence you will need to increase your chances of winning workers compensation benefits when you contract Covid.
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