BILL ANALYSIS �
AB 375
Page 1
ASSEMBLY THIRD READING
AB 375 (Skinner)
As Amended May 27, 2011
Majority vote
INSURANCE 8-4 APPROPRIATIONS 12-5
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|Ayes:|Solorio, Charles |Ayes:|Fuentes, Blumenfield, |
| |Calderon, Carter, Feuer, | |Bradford, Charles |
| |Hayashi, Skinner, Torres, | |Calderon, Campos, Davis, |
| |Wieckowski | |Gatto, Hall, Hill, Lara, |
| | | |Mitchell, Solorio |
| | | | |
|-----+--------------------------+-----+--------------------------|
|Nays:|Hagman, Grove, Miller, |Nays:|Harkey, Donnelly, |
| |Olsen | |Nielsen, Norby, Wagner |
| | | | |
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SUMMARY : Provides that methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus
aureus (MRSA) and blood-borne infectious diseases are presumed
to be job related if suffered or contracted by a hospital
employee. Specifically, this bill :
1)Specifies that the term "injury" as used in the workers'
compensation law with respect to specified hospital employees
shall include blood-borne infectious disease and MRSA that
develops or manifests itself during a person's employment at a
hospital.
2)Provides that these diseases shall be presumed to arise out of
and in the course of employment.
3)Allows the employer to dispute the presumption, requiring the
employer to prove by evidence that the disease is NOT related
to employment.
4)Specifies that the presumptions apply only to hospital
employees who provide direct patient care at an acute care
hospital.
5)Extends to 180 days the period beyond separation from hospital
employment during which a hospital employee may rely on the
presumption relating to blood-borne infectious disease.
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6)Extends to 90 days the period beyond separation from hospital
employment during which a hospital employee may rely on the
presumption relating to MRSA or back and neck injuries.
7)Contains legislative findings and declarations in support of
the bill's proposals.
EXISTING LAW :
1)Establishes a comprehensive system of workers' compensation
benefits for injuries, including diseases, that arise out of
and in the course of employment. The benefits include full
medical benefits to treat the injury or condition,
indemnification for temporary and permanent disability, and
death benefits, among other benefits.
2)Requires in most cases that the employee establish that the
injury or condition underlying the claim arose out of and in
the course of employment.
3)Provides safety officers (i.e., specified police, sheriff, and
firefighter employees) with a presumption that certain
injuries or conditions are related to employment. These
conditions or injuries are more extensive than, but include,
the conditions included in this bill.
FISCAL EFFECT : According to the Assembly Appropriations
Committee, potential workers compensation cost increase in the
range of $75,000 to $100,000 (various public funds), partially
offset by minor administrative savings from fewer dispute
resolution proceedings.
COMMENTS :
1)The author states that this bill is needed for the following
reasons:
According to U.S. Department of Labor, health care is the
second fastest growing sector of the United States
economy, employing over 12 million workers. Women
represent nearly 80 percent of the health care work
force.
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Registered nurses and hospital workers by the nature of
their work, which involves ill patients and medical
equipment, are in constant danger of being exposed to a
variety of illnesses and becoming injured by lifting and
mobilizing patients and by medical equipment. Because of
the physical nature of patient care, California's aging
nursing workforce, combined with rising patient acuity
and obesity, more work related injuries to the neck and
back and higher levels of exposure to infectious diseases
are occurring. Each year thousands of nurses, nursing
aides, and health care workers sustain musculoskeletal
disorders (MSDs) from manual lifting of patients and
residents.
According to the 2009 Bureau of Labor Statistics,
direct-care registered nurses ranked 7th among all
occupations for the number of cases of MSDs resulting in
days away from work exceeding that of workers in
construction, mining, and manufacturing.
Additionally, blood-borne diseases and
methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) are
contact work related hazards for hospital employees. In
California health care acquired infections in hospitals
account for an estimated 200,000 infections and 12,000
deaths annually, according to the State Department of
Public Health. MRSA is increasingly infecting hospital
workers and their patients. MRSA is one of the most
virulent types of antibiotic-resistant staph infections.
Although infection control measures help to stop the
spread of MRSA and other blood-borne diseases they do not
eliminate the job related threat of contracting MRSA or
other blood- borne diseases completely."
2)Under current law, the only employees (subject to two
exceptions discussed below) who receive the benefit of
presumptions that injuries or conditions are job-related are
police and firefighters - public safety employees. This bill
would extend this special benefit to private sector employees,
and to non-safety employees. The bill is therefore extending
the concept of presumptions in two novel respects.
The two exceptions to the "only public employees" and "only
safety officers" rules for presumptions involve somewhat
unique circumstances. In 2008, a small group of firefighters
AB 375
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who happen to be employed by a private contractor due to a
quirk in federal law were granted the same status with respect
to presumptions afforded public employee firefighters �(SB
1271 (Cedillo), Statutes 2008, Chapter 747]. The other
exception is for public employee lifeguards, and that
presumption is limited to skin cancer. Cancer was the initial
condition where the notion of presumptions was applied. The
policy is that it is a condition that intuitively is job
related, but due to the long latency period and uncertain
medical causation issues, difficult for the employee to prove.
3)Supporters point to the statistics surrounding injuries to
nurses and other hospital workers, including the consequences
of disease due to needle pricks, and argue that these
employees are providing critical services to their communities
and deserve the protection that a presumption of
compensability would afford them.
4)A presumption has historically been adopted when employees
have had difficulty proving that the injury or condition at
issue is job-related, while at the same time it is intuitively
logical that it is, in fact, job-related. The Insurance
Committee has not received information indicating that
hospital workers suffering from the conditions or injuries
that the bill would presume to be job-related have had
difficulty in the workers' compensation system establishing
that the injuries or conditions were in fact job-related.
5)The opponents argue that there is no rationale to extend the
concept of presumptions to employees who are not in the
traditional group - public safety officers - who have received
this special benefit due to the special dangers of the work
they do. Because of the unique role that public safety
officers play in our society, they have historically received
several different and unique benefits, including enhanced
retirement rules, special disability retirement rules,
enhanced temporary disability rules, and presumptions of
compensability. While these enhanced benefits may be
appropriate for public safety employees, it does not follow
that these rules should be expanded to other classes of
employee.
Opponents argue that there is no evidence that the normal rules
governing how injuries or conditions are proven to be
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job-related are not working properly with respect to the
employees and the conditions being addressed by the bill.
6)AB 664 (Skinner) of 2009 and AB 1994 (Skinner) of 2010
proposed similar provisions to AB 375 (Skinner), but also
included additional conditions to which the presumption would
apply, and, in some circumstances, longer post-employment
periods of time when the presumption would apply. AB 664 and
AB 1994 were held on the Assembly Appropriations Committee
suspense file.
Analysis Prepared by : Mark Rakich / INS. / (916) 319-2086
FN: 0000973