Whether the Mental Illness shall be deemed as the Work-related Injury?

The sales staff Zhang was suffering from depression. He asked the employer Company A to provide the work-related injury welfare, because he insisted that this disease was caused by the sales pressure, which should be ascertained as the work-related injury. Company A refused his request, it insisted that the mental illness did not belong to the scope of the work-related injury which as stipulated in the ‘Regulations on the Work-related Injury Insurances’. Then the dispute occurred.

In practice, with the severer competition, accelerated life pace, there are more and more labor cases related to the mental illness. While an employee suffers from the mental illness, such as melancholia, schizophrenia and etc., whether such illness could be ascertained as the work-related injury?

According to Article 1 and 14 of the ‘Regulations on the Work-related Injury Insurances’, the work-related injury shall be classified into 2 categories: (1) the employee who suffers from occupational diseases; or (2) the employee who is injured from accidents arising from work. For the first category, the ‘Law on the Prevention and Control of Occupational Diseases’ has clearly prescribed, the ‘occupational diseases’ refers to the diseases contracted by the employees for the exposures to toxic or harmful factors such as dust and radioactive substances in occupational activities. In view of this, the mental illness shall not be deemed as the ‘occupational diseases’. For the second category, the precondition of such injury shall be the accidents arising from work. In other words, when a mental illness was caused by the accidents arising from work, then such injury could be ascertained as the work-related injury. For example, in order to rescue the employer’s property, an employee hurt his head in the company, which caused the disorder of his cranial nerve, and finally he got schizophrenia. Then such mental illness shall be ascertained as the work-related injury.

Currently, China’s legislation prescribes strictly on the ascertainment of the work-related injury for those metal illnesses. Despite of the ‘occupational diseases’, the basic principle on the ascertainment of the work-related injury is ‘No Accident, No Work-related Injury’. Even if a mental illness is caused by the long-term huge work pressure, or lack of rest due to the extended working hours, it is very difficult to be ascertained as the work-related injury.

However, in the judicial practice, there is a breakthrough that the mental illness might be ascertained as a work-related injury. From the perspective of the civil law of causality, if the employee could prove that the illness results from the factors related to work, then such illness shall be ascertained as a work-related injury. In other words, this ‘Cause’ could be an accident, or the long-term fatigue or mental oppression and so on. Some countries have accepted the mental illnesses which are caused by the reason related to work but other than an accident, could be ascertained as the work-related injury. For example, in Japan, every year, there are hundreds of employees who suffer from the mental illness are ascertained as suffering from the work-related injury. And the reasons for such mental illness are the factors related to work other than an accident, such as a sudden increase of the workload which dramatically overwhelmed the employee, or the employee was abused by bullying or violence.

Fortunately, the Chinese judicial departments have changed a little bit from applying the articles directly to combining the legislation theory in the individual cases. For example, in a case, Yang is the employee of a railway station. His head was hit by an iron bar, which caused a mental disorder. Half a month later, he hurt his wife and child, and then committed suicide. Although, the ‘Regulations on the Work-related Injury Insurances’ has stipulated that the ‘Suicide’ shall not be ascertained as a work-related injury, the Beijing No.1 Intermediate People’s Court decided that the metal status of Yang was caused by the accident, under such metal status, his suicide had causality with the work, so such injury should be ascertained as the work-related injury.

To sum up, while dealing with such issues, the following aspects are highly recommended to be taken into consideration:
Firstly, the employer shall pay attention to the accidents related to the work. In order to prove the employer has fulfilled its duty of care, and reduce the risk of the mental illness, while an employee is involved in an accident, if the head, neck and other parts of the employee get hurt, it would be better for the employer to require the employee to do the medical diagnose on such parts.
Secondly, the employer shall pay attention to the relevance of the mental illness and the employee’s work. For those employees who have or likely to have the mental diseases, it would be better to avoid requiring such employees to work overtime too much, or assigning the important or urgent tasks. Meanwhile, if the relevant employees have any family history on the mental diseases, or other severe events, then the employer shall collect and reserve such evidence consciously.