Pre-existing illness may be compensable if aggravated by the seafarer’s work.
Thus ruled the Supreme Court in the case of seafarer Christopher Calera vs Hoegh Fleet Services Phil. (G.R. No. 250584, June 14, 2021) who was declared as totally and permanently disabled due to a back injury.
Before actual boarding of the vessel, the seafarer slipped in the bathroom of the hotel and suffered injury. Upon embarkation, he immediately reported the incident, as well as the excruciating pain and recurring numbness he had been experiencing on his lower back and extremity after said incident. He requested for pain reliever but was not given any. And instead of showing compassion, his superiors ordered him to immediately get to work, making him carry heavy baggage and cans of grease. Due to continuous pain, he was medically repatriated a month after embarkation. The company denied liability arguing that he was claiming compensation for an illness—lumbar disc disease, different from that for which he was repatriated—perianal abscess.
The Court ruled in favor of the seafarer noting that he was already suffering from mechanical lumbago and perianal abscess upon embarkation. Circumstances show that the injury suffered at the hotel that would have otherwise been not compensable was aggravated by his work on board the vessel.
The Court stressed that the injury was work-related or more specifically, work-aggravated due to the strenuous work on the first day and lack of medical attention, the seafarer’s condition worsened, and he even had difficulty getting out of bed the next day.
The POEA standard employment contract (SEC) defines work-related injury as one “arising out of and in the course of employment.”
Compensable illness or injury cannot be confined to the strict interpretation of the POEA-SEC as pre-existing conditions may be compensable if aggravated by the seafarer’s work.
His duties and responsibilities involved carrying heavy loads and the performance of other strenuous activities such that it can reasonably be concluded that his work caused or at least aggravated his illness.
It is of no moment that he suffered the injury at the hotel for it is not necessary that the nature of the employment be the sole and only reason for the illness or injury suffered by the seafarer.
It is not required that the employment be the sole factor in the growth, development, or acceleration of the illness to entitle the claimant to the benefits incident thereto.
Regardless if the illness is listed or not as occupational diseases, it is enough that the employment had contributed, even in a small measure, to the development of the disease.
In Magsaysay v. Laurel (March 20, 2013 GR 195518), the seafarer’s constant exposure to hazards such as chemicals and the varying temperature, coupled by stressful tasks in his employment caused the aggravation of a seafarer’s medical condition.
In Seagull Shipmgt. v. NLRC (388 Phil. 906), the seafarer had served the contract for a significantly long amount of time and his work exposed him to different climates and unpredictable weather, which could trigger a heart attack or heart failure. His employment had contributed, even to a small degree, to the development and exacerbation of his disease.
In Calvero v. E.C.C., (117 SCRA 452), the Court stressed that the exact cause of the ailment suffered is not significant, and the possibility that factors other than the employment, such as advancing age, may have caused or contributed to the development of the ailment, is not a drawback; for what is material and decisive is that the employment contributed even in a small degree in aggravating the ailment.
In Corcoro, Jr. v. Magsaysay MOL Marine Inc. (GR 226779, August 24, 2020), the Court said that while the seafarer has a preexisting illness, such does not prove that his working condition did not aggravate the illness. When it is shown that the seafarer’s work that required physical labor wherein he performed a wide variety of responsibilities, may have contributed to the establishment or, at the very least, aggravation of any pre-existing disease, the condition/illness suffered by the seafarer shall be compensable.
In Nisda v. Sea Serve Maritime Agency (GR 179177, 23 July 2009), once an illness is shown to have supervened in the course of employment, there arises a rebuttable presumption in law that illness arose out of, or at least was aggravated by, such employment.
In Castor-Garupa v. ECC (GR 158268, April 12, 2006), the degree of proof required to validate work connection is merely substantial evidence, that is, such relevant evidence as a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to support a conclusion. What the law requires is a reasonable work-connection and not direct causal relation. It is enough that the hypothesis on which the workman’s claim is based is probable. Probability, not the ultimate degree of certainty, is the test of proof in compensation proceedings.
Atty. Dennis R. Gorecho heads the Seafarers’ Division of the Sapalo Velez Bundang Bulilan Law Offices. For comments, e-mail info@sapalovelez.com, or call 0917-5025808 or 0908-8665786.
