What is Presumptive Legislation?

What is presumptive legislation? As its name implies, presumptive legislation presumes for the purpose of worker compensation that a fire fighter’s brain cancer, for example, is the result of their employment as a career fire fighter, if they have been a fire fighter for a certain number of years.

Typically, presumptive legislation amends a state’s workplace compensation legislation to state that if a career fire fighter develops a certain form of cancer, it is presumed that the cancer is a direct result of their occupation as a fire fighter, and that compensation will be granted.

In the absence of presumptive legislation, the onus is on the worker to prove their illness is a result of their occupation. Presumptive legislation changes that onus; the claim is approved automatically if the appropriate criteria are met, unless the employer can demonstrate that the illness is not a result of the fire fighter’s occupation.

Without presumptive legislation, a worker who contracts an illness as the result of their job must file a worker’s compensation claim, and endure the uncertainties of the claim process. This system of claims and appeals can take years to produce a final decision. Even so, there is still no guarantee the worker’s compensation claim system will recognize an occupational disease and award appropriate compensation. There are cases where a fire fighter who contracted cancer as the result of years of toxic exposures and filed a claim was asked, “At which fire did you contract this cancer?”

The latent nature of the disease poses other considerations. Many fire fighters who are currently battling cancer suffered their exposures decades ago, when less was known about the importance of respiratory and other protections and when protective equipment was built to lower standards than today. In some cases, individual fire departments didn’t provide enough SCBAs to equip everyone at the scene of a fire; some were lucky to get one while others entered a fire without any respiratory protection. They may have made it home safely at the end of their shift, week after week, month after month; not knowing the seeds of a brain cancer or a leukemia that developed 20 years later had been irrevocably planted.

The days of entering fires without respiratory protection are over, and fire departments across the country are implementing comprehensive fitness and wellness programs.  Most fire departments require annual medical examinations that include screening for cancers and infectious diseases.  Fire fighters have better understanding of the products of combustion and the adverse effects upon their health, yet, in spite of these improvements fire fighting is still one of the most dangerous occupations in the United States.  For example, one in three fire fighters in Los Angeles is expected to develop cancer by the age of 60. The introduction of new chemicals, plastics, and building materials continue to contribute to the myriad of toxins that fire fighters will encounter in their career.  As long as fire fighters are exposed to these toxins while serving the public, some will contract job-related diseases as a direct result.  This makes it all the more important to pass presumptive legislation; to protect Alaska’s fire fighters and their survivors.