Réada Cronin (Kildare North, Sinn Fein)
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107. To ask the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment when his Department will move to recognise long-Covid in healthcare workers and others as an occupational injury, after they contracted Covid-19 on the front line, often when PPE was sparse; the current liaising that is taking place with the Departments of Health and Social Protection on same; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [8519/23]

Neale Richmond (Dublin Rathdown, Fine Gael)
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As a public health infectious disease COVID-19 is a notifiable disease in Ireland since February 2020. It is notifiable to the Chief Medical Officer of the Department of Health and to the Health Protection Surveillance Centre like other public health infectious diseases.

Under the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work (General Application) Regulations 2016 all employers and self-employed persons are legally obliged to report all injuries, as a result of an accident while at work, if the employee is unable to carry out their normal work for more than three consecutive days. Diseases, occupational illnesses or any impairments of mental condition are not reportable to the Health and Safety Authority.

However, separately, on foot of an EU Directive, COVID-19 is designated as a biological agent under the Safety, Health and Welfare at Work (Biological Agents) (Amendment) Regulations 2020 (introduced on 22 November 2020). In conjunction with the introduction of the Regulations, the Health and Safety Authority introduced the 2020 Biological Agents Code of Practice. Under this Code of Practice an employer who becomes aware of a confirmed case of COVID-19 in an employee, as a result of the employee carrying out direct or deliberate work with coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, is required to notify the Health and Safety Authority. Reporting COVID-19 under the Biological Agents Regulations is about the reporting of COVID-19 when it is acquired as opposed to “Long Covid” which can be a resulting long-term condition.

I would stress that these Regulations, and the Code of Practice, have no bearing on the specific and separate issue of the inclusion of Long-Covid, in the Department of Social Protection’s Occupational Injuries Benefit Scheme. Any decision to include COVID-19 in the Occupational Injuries Benefit Scheme rests with the Minister for Social Protection.

I can confirm that correspondence from the Minister for Social Protection was recently received concerning an EU Commission communication recommending the recognition of COVID-19 as an occupational disease in specific circumstances. A reply issued to the Minister for Social Protection in early February.