The NJ Legislature is considering expanding the multitiered program to compensate the victims of industrial illness. This time a supplemental benefit program is being offered to compensate healthcare workers who contracted COVID-19.
The proposal highlights the general inadequacies of the system to compensate workers equally without segregating the component of anticipated risk. Under the initially crafted system, all workers were treated equally.
PROPOSED LEGISLATION
Under the recently introduced legislation, The Health Care Workers COVID-19 Supplemental Benefits Program, A5540/S3964. This proposed law would establish the Health Care Workers COVID-19 Supplemental Benefits Program in the Division of Workers' Compensation.
SUPPLEMENTAL BENEFITS
The bill provides supplemental benefits to healthcare workers determined to be eligible for workers’ compensation because they have contracted COVID-19 during employment. The supplemental benefits are provided when an eligible healthcare worker qualifies for regular workers’ compensation equal to 70 percent of the weekly wages received at the time of injury, subject to the stated minimum and maximum compensation levels. The supplemental benefits do not commence until all benefits equal to the healthcare worker’s full salary have ended. The supplemental benefits are provided if the healthcare worker cannot work due to COVID-19 but not more than 180 weeks. The amount of the supplemental benefit is such that the sum of the weekly regular workers’ compensation plus the weekly supplemental benefit equals 100 percent of the health care worker’s weekly wage, except that that sum shall not exceed $1,800, with similar adjustments made to compensation paid to volunteer health care workers.
SHIFTING COSTS ONTO THE TAXPAYER
The bill directs the Commissioner of Labor and Workforce Development to issue annual reports of the available information regarding the number of claims by healthcare workers entitled to the supplemental benefits, the total amount of benefits awarded, the total anticipated and the accrued costs of the benefits, and an estimate of what portion of the funds appropriated for the program will be needed to pay all of the benefits, and a request to the Governor and the Legislature for any additional appropriation which may be required to make the payments. The supplemental benefits are not to be considered in determining the annual surcharge levied on policyholders and self-insured employers for the Second Injury Fund or the experience ratings of individual employers.
COVID-19 SUPPLEMENTAL BENEFITS ADVISORY COUNCIL
The bill establishes the Health Care Workers COVID-19 Supplemental Benefits Program Advisory Council in the Division of Workers' Compensation to advise the division and provide program administration recommendations. The advisory council will be dissolved, and the annual reports by the council and the commissioner will cease upon a determination that all eligible healthcare workers have received all supplemental benefits to which they are entitled.
The bill appropriates from the General Fund to the Second Injury Fund $30,000,000 from the Health Care Workers COVID-19 Supplemental Benefits Program to provide the supplemental benefits and any necessary expenses of the advisory council.
ALL WORKERS ARE VULNERABLE
This legislation aims to assist healthcare workers whose public service has rendered them particularly vulnerable to COVID-19 by alleviating long-term economic hardships due to COVID-19. Advocates for the legislation argue that the support provided by the bill is essential in cases where healthcare workers become unable to work for extended periods because of persistent, long-term symptoms following recovery from acute COVID-19, colloquially known as “long COVID.”
UPGRADE BENEFITS FOR ALL WORKERS
Supplementing benefits is an admirable gesture. Again, it highlights the overall inadequacy of benefits available to injured workers and their dependents under the existing program. A universal upgrade of benefits should be afforded to all workers and not merely a single class of workers, as all workers are susceptible to infections and diseases. COVID-19 is undoubtedly not going to be the last universal outbreak of infection in the workplace, and it would be better to modify the Workers' Compensation Act for those contingencies now for all workers.
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Jon L. Gelman of Wayne, NJ, is the author of NJ Workers’ Compensation Law (Thomson-Reuters) and co-author of the national treatise Modern Workers’ Compensation Law (Thomson-Reuters). For over five decades, the Law Offices of Jon L Gelman 1.973.696.7900 jon@gelmans.com have represented injured workers and their families who have suffered occupational accidents and illnesses.
Blog: Workers ' Compensation
LinkedIn: JonGelman
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Author: "Workers' Compensation Law" West-Thomson-Reuters
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