Calls get louder for changes to PTSD coverage

Richmond Fire-Rescue Capt. Bryan Kongus was remembered at his Monday funeral as a husband and father, a friend and a brother, a hero, and the latest of all too many first responders to die after living with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Kongus’ full honours funeral for his line-of-duty death comes in advance of an expected move by the province to simplify the process for first responders to make claims of PTSD.

WorkSafeBC, a provincial agency that pays compensation for employment-related injuries, provides coverage for mental disorders, so long as the disorder is caused by the workplace.

However, B.C. does not presume a worker’s psychological injury occurred at or because of their work — even in the case of first responders who are regularly exposed to traumatic incidents — according to the Canadian Labour Congress. That means workers need to prove the connection themselves. even as they are coping with PTSD.

In an email, WorkSafeBC spokesperson Trish Knight Chernecki said the agency couldn’t comment directly on Kongus’ case, but did point to a number of measures put in place in the last three years to support the mental health of workers, including providing social workers across the province, contracted by WorkSafeBC for crisis intervention and mental health support, creating a cross-agency committee to promote mental health resources available to first responders and a centralized mental health clinic and crisis line.

In 2012, “legislation was passed to expand workers’ compensation coverage for mental disorder claims,” Chernecki added.

Labour Minister Harry Bains, who is on holidays and could not be reached, told the CBC in September that legislation to improve the system was in the works.

But on Monday, neither the labour ministry nor WorkSafeBC answered a request to comment on the status of this supposedly proposed legislation.

Some have called for B.C. to institute a so-called presumptive clause in relation to claims by first responders, as other provinces have done. Under such a clause, a first responder’s PTSD would be assumed to have originated from traumatic experiences on the job unless there was evidence to the contrary.

So far this year, 14 first responders in B.C. have taken their own lives, according to the Tema Conter Memorial Trust, a charity that provides research, education and training, as well as support to public-safety workers. They are among 56 to have done so across Canada this year. Last year, 19 first responders in B.C. took their own lives, as did 14 in 2015, according to the trust.

It is unclear how many of those first responders suffered from PTSD before their deaths, but recent suicides of those who did, including that of Surrey firefighter Kevin Hegarty, brought the matter to the attention of politicians and policy-makers.

MLA Shane Simpson, now the minister of social development and poverty reduction, brought forward a private member’s bill to institute a presumptive clause for first responders, and the Union of B.C. Municipalities has called for the same.

Earlier this year, WorkSafeBC determined the death of Ernie Dombrowski, a Surrey firefighter who took his own life, was due to psychological injury suffered on the job.

Dombrowski died in 2015 and the WorkSafe claim took nine months to resolve. The ruling meant the family could receive survivor’s benefits.