Urge Senators to Oppose SB 632

  • Kathryn Austin Scott

    Senior Vice President, State Relations and Advocacy

ACTION NEEDED

To continue opposition to the workers’ compensation presumptive eligibility bill — Senate Bill (SB) 632 — asking all hospitals to do two things: 

  1. Write a letter to your senator using this template letter. Letters should be emailed directly to senators’ offices and not submitted via the online letter submission portal (once you have sent your letter, please send a copy to Coni Segretto at csegretto@calhospital.org so we can track submissions). Please email your senators no later than May 20.  
  2. Email your organization’s logo to Coni Segretto (csegretto@calhospital.org) by May 20 so it can be added to a coalition floor alert that CHA would submit if the bill is headed to a floor vote.

TIMING

Letters and hospital logos should be submitted by COB May 20.

RESOURCES

BACKGROUND

CHA continues opposition to SB 632 (Arreguín, D-Berkeley), which would create a series of workers’ compensation rebuttable presumptions for hospital employees for a variety of infectious and respiratory diseases including COVID-19 and SARS and extend the presumptions after the employee’s termination.

The bill is currently on suspense in the Senate Appropriations Committee and has until May 23 to be taken off suspense to proceed to the Senate floor.

SB 632 would undermine a highly effective and well-regarded workers’ compensation system in California by creating the first-ever broad-based private sector workers’ compensation presumption that a variety of illnesses and injuries — including COVID-19 — arose in the course of providing direct patient care at hospitals.

This would set a troubling precedent that has the potential to significantly alter the state’s workers’ compensation system. Also, the creation of these presumptions is unsupported by data: 

  • Historical data from the California Workers’ Compensation Institute show that health care employers have one of the lowest denial rates of any sector for workers who file workers’ compensation claims. Health employers approve more than 90% of all claims — irrefutable proof that the system is taking care of its workers when they get sick or are injured on the job. 

The conditions that SB 632 would cover are already addressed in the current workers’ compensation system: 

  • Infectious diseases such as staph infections, tuberculosis, meningitis, bloodborne infections, and respiratory diseases such as COPD, COVID-19, and all its variants 
  • Post-traumatic stress disorder 
  • Musculoskeletal injuries (muscle, tendon, ligament, nerve, joint, bone, and blood vessel) 
  • Cancers such as liver, myeloid leukemia, kidney, multiple myeloma, ovarian, breast, nasopharyngeal, thyroid, brain, nervous system, HPV-positive tonsillar, and others 

Any increase in workers’ compensation costs will directly and immediately increase the cost of health care at a time when affordability of care is a priority. This action would also make hospitals — already steeling for likely Medicare and Medicaid cuts — even more vulnerable and challenged in providing access to high-quality care. Even a single claim, which could be filed up to 10 years after employment ends, could be valued in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. CHA estimates this new mandate will cost hospitals $1.6 billion.