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Following is a question by the Hon Poon Siu-ping and a reply by the Secretary for Labour and Welfare, Mr Matthew Cheung Kin-chung, in the Legislative Council today (June 11):
Question:
According to the 2013 Report on Annual Earnings and Hours Survey published by the Census and Statistics Department, as at the middle of last year, some half a million of employees were engaged in the catering and retail industries, accounting for about one-sixth of Hong Kong's workforce. Some members of the catering and retail industries have relayed to me that quite a number of frontline employees in the industries suffer from diseases involving lower limb musculoskeletal disorders (LLMD), as they need to stand for a long time at work. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
(1) whether there were employees in the catering and retail industries receiving compensation under the Employees' Compensation Ordinance in the past three years for permanent total or partial incapacity resulting from work-related LLMD during the course of employment; if so, of the details; if not, the reasons for that; and
(2) given that currently, upper limb disorders like traumatic inflammation of the tendons of the hand or forearm, or of the associated tendon sheaths, have been listed as occupational diseases, whether it will include diseases of LLMD (such as osteoarthritis of knee, lower limb varicose vein and plantar fasciitis) in the list of compensable occupational diseases in the Second Schedule of the Employees¡¦Compensation Ordinance; if so, of the details; if not, the reasons for that?
Reply:
President,
Under the Employees' Compensation Ordinance (ECO), an employee may apply for compensation if he/she suffers from an occupational disease which is prescribed under the ECO and can be attributed to the nature of any employment in which the employee was employed within the prescribed period prior to contracting such disease. The ECO also stipulates that even though an employee suffers from a disease which is not a prescribed occupational disease in the ECO, the employee may apply for compensation if he/she can provide evidence that an injury was sustained as a result of an accident arising out of and in the course of employment in a particular case. The Labour Department (LD) will, depending on the circumstances of individual cases, assist the employer and the employee to process the claim for compensation under the ECO. For musculoskeletal diseases, as medical evidence indicates that certain musculoskeletal diseases (including tenosynovitis of hand or forearm, tennis elbow, carpal tunnel syndrome, knee bursitis or subcutaneous cellulitis, etc.) have a clear association with a particular occupation, LD has prescribed these diseases as occupational diseases.
My reply to the question raised by the Hon Poon Siu-ping is as follows:
(1) Beat knee (i.e. knee bursitis or subcutaneous cellulitis) is an occupational lower limb musculoskeletal disease listed in the ECO. As LD did not receive any notification of any occupational disease of beat knee in the past three years, there was no compensation case involving employees. Nor did LD receive any compensation claim for suffering other lower limb musculoskeletal diseases arising out of and in the course of their employment during the same period.
(2) Occupational disease refers to those diseases which have clear and strong relationship with certain occupations, and usually there is only one causal factor involved. In considering whether a disease should be prescribed as an occupational disease under the ECO, LD would consider whether there is direct causal relationship between the disease and certain type of work, including whether there is any medical evidence to indicate that the disease is clearly associated with a particular occupation. For lower limb musculoskeletal diseases, the ECO has prescribed beat knee as an occupational disease. As regards other lower limb musculoskeletal diseases (including degeneration or inflammation of the knee joint, lower limb varicose vein and plantar fasciitis, etc.), apart from work, they can also be caused by other factors including those that have no direct relationship with work, such as personal living and eating habits, age, medical history, family history, etc. These diseases do not fall under the definition of occupational diseases.
Even when the disease concerned is not a prescribed occupational disease in the ECO, an employee suffering from a lower limb musculoskeletal disease may still submit a claim for compensation under the ECO if he/she can provide evidence that an injury was sustained as a result of an accident arising out of and in the course of employment in a particular case. LD will, depending on the circumstances of individual cases, assist the employer and the employee to process the claim for compensation under the ECO.
Ends/Wednesday, June 11, 2014
Issued at HKT 12:42
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