Workers’ Compensation and controversial illnesses

Katherine Lippel

Université du Québec à Montréal, Département des sciences juridiques, c.p. 8888, Succursale Centre Ville, Montréal H3C3P8, Québec, lippel.katherine@uqam.ca

Abstract

Workers in Québec have the right to compensation if they become incapable of working because of illness attributable to a work accident or considered to be an occupational  disease. When the aetiology of  disease is controversial, as in the case of many musculo-skeletal disorders, or when the existence of a disease is questioned by the medical establishment, as in the case of fibromyalgia, multiple chemical sensitivities syndrome, and sick building syndrome, it becomes difficult to access economic support from workers’ compensation systems in the event of disability. In this chapter we examine workers’ compensation appeal cases in Québec with regards to these illnesses. After making the distinction between illness that is made to seem controversial by medico-legal arguments as opposed to illnesses that are actually controversial in the medical community, the article examines case law concerning each type of illness and obstacles to compensation that are specific to each illness. The Court of Appeal has ordered the workers’ compensation appeal tribunals to compensate when proof in a given case shows that it is more probable than not that working conditions or a work accident triggered the illness, even though no consensus exists in the scientific community with regard to that illness. As a result, access to compensation for fibromyalgia and, to a lesser extent, for Multiple chemical sensitivity syndrome, has been slightly less difficult. The article concludes with a discussion of the effects of the stringent criteria applied by the appeal tribunal on the workers suffering from a controversial illness and a reminder that workers and their families pay the price when compensation is denied because of controversy.

Introduction