Louisiana: Worker Awarded Benefits for West Nile Virus

A Louisiana worker, who contended he contracted the West Nile virus from a mosquito bite that occurred in his employer’s break room, sustained an accidental injury that arose out of and in the course of his employment. Affirming a factual finding by a state workers’ compensation judge, the Louisiana appellate court acknowledged a deep conflict in the evidence, but concluded that the worker had successfully established that it was more likely than not he contracted the virus as he alleged. The employer countered that there had been a widespread outbreak of the virus in the parish where the employee lived and that the worker’s evidence of employment-related contact with mosquitos was speculative. Among other things, the case illustrates the importance of winning at the trial level on the facts.

Thomas A. Robinson, J.D., the Feature National Columnist for the LexisNexis Workers’ Compensation eNewsletter, is the co-author of Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law (LexisNexis).

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis 

See Allen v. Graphic Packaging Int’l, Inc., 2017 La. App. LEXIS 35 (Jan. 11, 2017)

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 5.06.

Source: Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the nation’s leading authority on workers’ compensation law

 For a more detailed discussion of the case, see