CALIXTA MERCADO, PETITIONER, VS. WORKMEN’S COM­PENSATION COMMISSION AND RIVERSIDE MILLS CORPORATION, RESPONDENTS.

Mercado versus Workmen's Compensation Commission

The Case

This is a petition for review brought by Calixta Mercado, widow of the late Regalado Mercado, against the Workmen's Compensation Commission and Riverside Mills Corporation. The widow seeks to overturn the Commission's reversal of a death compensation award earlier granted by the Acting Referee of the Department of Labor. The case matters because it is a clean illustration of the statutory presumption of compensability under the Workmen's Compensation Act, and of the rule that the employment need not be the sole cause of the illness or death.

Procedural History

The widow filed a claim for death compensation benefits with the Regional Office of the Department of Labor, which the employer controverted. The Acting Referee rendered a decision in her favor, ordering the employer to pay death benefits and burial expenses, plus attorney's fees and an administrative fee. The employer's motion for reconsideration was denied. On appeal, the Workmen's Compensation Commission reversed the Acting Referee and dismissed the claim for lack of merit. The widow then came to the Supreme Court on a petition for review, which the Court treated as a special civil action.

Facts

Regalado Mercado began working for Riverside Mills Corporation in 1963 as a weaver, earning nine pesos and seventy centavos a day. In October 1973 he felt occasional stomach pains. He was examined by Dra. Concepcion Carambas and found to be suffering from cirrhosis of the liver, with a secondary condition, and the physician attributed the illness to malnutrition. Despite his ailment, he continued working.

His condition deteriorated. He was brought to the company clinic and later confined at the company's designated hospital. He was treated again by Dra. Carambas in April and May 1974. Her report stated that his illness was aggravated by his employment, owing to heavy physical exertion and irregular meals. He died on October 31, 1974.

On March 30, 1975, his widow filed the claim for herself and their seven children. The employer controverted it. The Acting Referee awarded benefits, but the Commission reversed, finding the illness not work-connected or work-aggravated. A physician of the Commission did not dispute the attending physician's finding of cirrhosis, though she suggested the illness could also be due to drinking liquor, a habit not shown in the records.

Issues

• Whether or not the illness of Regalado Mercado which caused his death is compensable under the Workmen's Compensation Act, as amended.
• Whether or not the legal presumption that the illness arose out of or was aggravated by the employment applies once the illness supervened during the employment.

Applicable Provisions

Section 44 of the Workmen's Compensation Act, as amended, provides the presumption the Court relies upon:

In the absence of substantial evidence to the contrary, it shall be presumed that the claim is compensable and that the injury or death was caused by the employment or arose out of and in the course of the employment.

This presumption relieves the claimant of proving causation once the illness supervened during the employment, and shifts the burden to the employer.

Ruling

On the first issue, the Court held the illness compensable. The employer had about three thousand five hundred employees, so it can be presumed that Mercado was medically examined and found fit before he was hired. If after ten years of continuous work he began to suffer stomach pains that turned out to be cirrhosis, the illness supervened in the course of his employment or was at least aggravated by it. The attending physician's report supported this.

On the second issue, the Court held that the presumption applied. Once the claimant establishes that the illness supervened during the employment, the legal presumption under Section 44 arises, and the burden of proving that the illness was not work-connected or work-aggravated shifts to the employer. The Commission's speculation about liquor was unsupported by the records. The Court also stressed that the employment need not be the sole factor:

It is enough that the employment had contributed, even in a small degree, to the development of the disease and in the bringing about of his death.

Doctrine

Once a claimant shows that the illness supervened during the employment, Section 44 of the Workmen's Compensation Act raises a rebuttable presumption that the illness arose out of or was at least aggravated by the employment. The burden then shifts to the employer to prove otherwise. It is not required that the employment be the sole cause; it is enough that it contributed even in a small degree to the development of the disease and to the death.

Disposition

The Court reversed and set aside the judgment of the Workmen's Compensation Commission and reinstated the decision of the Acting Referee, with no pronouncement as to costs.

Remember This

Memorize the line: it is enough that the employment contributed, even in a small degree, to the development of the disease and the death. Examiners use this case to test the Section 44 presumption and the shifting of the burden of proof to the employer.