The Employees’ Compensation Commission (ECC), an attached agency of the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), recently revised the conditions for compensability of Pulmonary Tuberculosis (PTB) in order to keep abreast with recent developments in the field of occupational medicine.

The revised conditions for compensability of Pulmonary Tuberculosis, commonly  known   as TB, expands the conditions of compensability  to include workers in high risk occupational groups like staff of correctional facilities or jails;  workers involved in the collection, handling or disposal of biological wastes; workers who have been clinically diagnosed with Silicosis or those exposed to silica in the course of their employment and workers in workplaces characterized as overcrowded, poorly ventilated and enclosed where there are documented cases of active TB.

Prior to the amendment, the Employees’ Compensation Program (ECP) compensates PTB to workers involved in close and frequent contact with source of tuberculosis infection by reason of employment like those involved in the medical treatment or nursing of a person or persons suffering from tuberculosis, as a laboratory worker, pathologist or post mortem worker, where occupation involves working with material which is a source of tuberculosis infection.

The ECC, as a policy making body of the ECP, continuously upgrade the benefit structure for workers through updating the conditions for compensability of occupational diseases under Annex “A” of PD 626, as amended.

For detailed conditions for compensability of occupational diseases and work-related illnesses under the EC Program, please call 899-42-51 or 52 or visit our website at www.ecc.gov.ph.