N.Y. Top Court Upholds Award for Retail Manager who Caught COVID, Had Stroke

Case File

Can persistent, high-risk exposure to a disease in the workplace culminating in infection constitute a compensable accident under New York's Workers' Compensation Law? As Simply Research subscribers know, it can and did for a Family Dollar manager.

Case

Matter of Aungst v. Family Dollar, No. 92 (N.Y. 11/24/25)

What Happened?

Shortly after the onset of the global COVID-19 pandemic, a store manager for a New York Family Dollar store contracted the disease and, within a week, suffered a stroke. The manager filed a workers' compensation claim, alleging that he contracted COVID due to exposure of the virus "at the job site" and that his stroke was a direct result of the disease. Family Dollar controverted the claim.

At a hearing, the manager's vascular neurologist opined that there was a connection between the manager's COVID-19 diagnosis and subsequent stroke because the manager did not exhibit typical risk factors for a stroke and experienced a "classic pattern" of a COVID-related stroke that presents in up to 5% of COVID patients.

The Workers' Compensation Law Judge established the claim, and the Board agreed, determining that the relevant caselaw indicated that if a claimant contracts COVID-19 through close contact with the public, such exposure could be a work-related accident within the meaning of the Workers' Compensation Law.

In the Board's view, the evidence was sufficient to conclude that an accident arose in the course of the manager's employment resulting in a causally related COVID-19 infection and that the manager sustained a consequential stroke.

The Appellate Division affirmed, and Family Dollar appealed to New York's highest court.

Rule of Law

Under New York law, a workers' compensation claimant can demonstrate COVID exposure at work by showing COVID's "prevalence" in the workplace. "Prevalence" is evidence of significantly elevated hazards of environmental exposure that are endemic to or in a workplace that demonstrates that the level of exposure is extraordinary.

A claimant may demonstrate prevalence through evidence of the nature and extent of work activities, which must include significant contact with the public or coworkers in an area where COVID-19 is present.

What the New York Court of Appeals Said

The Court of Appeals agreed with the Board's prevalence framework, reasoning that to establish an illness due to pathogens or adverse environmental conditions is compensable, a claimant must demonstrate that the illness was caused by "extraordinary" workplace exposure.

According to the court substantial evidence supported the Board's finding that the manager's COVID-19 was an accidental injury arising out of the manager's employment because:

(1) The manager submitted evidence of the virus's rapid spread in the area where the store was located during the time in question.

(2) The manager worked in a busy, essential retail role.

(3) The store was frequented by members of the public, only some of whom wore face masks and complied with Family Dollar's social distancing policy.

(4) The manager was "constantly" in close proximity with customers.

(5) The manager and his coworkers were instructed not to enforce masking and social distancing rules.

(6) The manager was not given a protective face mask to wear at work until mid-April 2020.

(7) The manager was working 50 or more hours a week at the store.

(8) The manager lived alone and did not use public transportation.

(9) The manger had not traveled or visited family or friends in the weeks prior to testing positive for COVID.

"The Board rationally concluded that claimant's workplace conditions significantly elevated his risk of contracting COVID-19 above the ordinary," the Court of Appeals wrote. "It was 'reasonable and plausible' for the Board to conclude that claimant faced an extraordinary risk of exposure to the virus at work and contracted COVID-19 as a result of the exposure."

Likewise, the court found that substantial evidence supported the Board's determination that the manager's stroke was compensable as a consequential injury.

"Claimant's treating neurologist opined that his stroke resulted from his COVID-19 an explained that claimant did not have other common risks factors for stroke," the Court of Appeals wrote. "The neurologist also stated that those with COVID-19 face elevated risks of blood clots and stroke, which affect up to 5% of such patients, and that the type and timing of claimant's stroke were consistent with a COVID-19 related stroke."

Case Examples

In reaching its decision, the court analyzed several on-point cases:

Matter of Lerner v. Rump Bros., 241 NY 153 (N.Y. 1925). An employee has a right to recover an award when a disease is developed during the course of the employment only where the inception of the disease is assignable to a "determinate or single act, identified in space or time" and is "assignable to something catastrophic or extraordinary."

Matter of Masse v. Robinson Co., 301 NY 34 (N.Y. 1950). An injury need not be precisely identified in space or time or attributable to a singular catastrophic or extraordinary event to be a compensable accident. Instead, courts determine whether an event is accidental "not by any legal definition, but by the commonsense viewpoint of the average person."

Matter of Middleton v. Coxsackie Correctional Facility, 38 NY2d 130 (N.Y. 1975). The "time-definiteness" requirement "can be thought of as applying to either the cause or the result, so that there can be a compensable accident where there is an exposure to a condition over a protracted period during which the victim succumbs to a disease culminating in a relatively sudden collapse; and it is not decisive that a claimant is unable to pinpoint the exact date on which the incident occurred."

Matter of McDonough v. Whitney Point Cent. School, 15 AD2d 191 (N.Y. App. Div. 1961). The Appellate Division sustained an award to a teacher who contracted mumps after exposure to an unusual amount of germs while teaching, including via close contact with pupils in her classroom, approximately 10 of whom contracted the disease.

Matter of Johannesen, 84 NY2d 129 (N.Y. 1994). The Court of Appeals sustained the claimant's award for bronchial asthma aggravated by exposure to tobacco smoke and dust in her workplace, noting that this exposure constituted an "accident" because the claimant was required to work in an unventilated office and forced to share the polluted atmosphere with numerous smokers. Claimants are required to show "unusual environmental conditions or events assignable to something extraordinary that caused an accidental injury." The claimant met this burden because she faced "seriously adverse environmental conditions."

Verdict: The Court of Appeals affirmed with costs the order of the Appellate Division.

Takeaway

In New York, persistent, high-risk exposure to a disease in the workplace culminating in infection can constitute a compensable accident.

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