Colorado’s second-highest court ruled for the first time on Thursday that COVID-19 is an “occupational disease” that entitled the widow of a deceased nursing home employee to workers’ compensation benefits.

Vincent Gaines was a floor technician at the University Park Care Center in Pueblo County, operated by Life Care Centers of America. Although there was no evidence Gaines came into contact with anyone with COVID-19, he became ill with the disease in late May 2020 and entered the hospital on June 2. Gaines died one month later.

Gaines’ widow, Sheila Jackson, sought temporary disability benefits for the last month of Gaines’ life and also death benefits. Under Colorado’s workers’ comp law, benefits are available for occupational diseases, meaning those that directly result from employment and are “fairly traceable” to the job. Occupational diseases cannot come from a hazard the employee is exposed to equally outside of work.

Life Care Centers repeatedly contested Jackson’s entitlement to the payments, arguing the evidence did not show her husband’s COVID-19 infection arose from his work. But a three-judge panel for the Court of Appeals disagreed.

Initially, an administrative law judge heard testimony from Life Care Centers representatives about the environment inside the facility at the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Jackson also testified that three of the four people in her household, including Gaines, worked at the Pueblo nursing home, but they took precautions to avoid transmission.

Finally, a doctor of internal medicine, provided an expert report that concluded Gaines more likely contracted COVID-19 at work than at home or anyplace else.

The administrative law judge sided with Jackson, finding that even if there was no proof of direct contact between Gaines and anyone who was COVID-19-positive, the nature of the virus meant Gaines could have interacted with people who were contagious but not yet displaying symptoms.

A panel of the Industrial Claim Appeals Office rejected Life Care Centers’ appeal of the decision, finding the “reasoned statistical analysis” was sufficient to show Gaines’ exposure likely came from work.

From there, Life Care Centers, joined by its insurer Old Republic Insurance Company, turned to the Court of Appeals.

“A lot of people died from COVID. Millions of people died from COVID. There’s not always an entity to assign blame,” James B. Fairbanks, the company’s lawyer, told the appellate panel during oral arguments.

“Would you have had to, like — genetic sequencing of the strain of COVID he died from?” asked Judge Matthew D. Grove. “What would have been sufficient in your view to show the decedent got the disease at work?”

“Contact with a worker who was known to have COVID,” responded Fairbanks.

But patients in the facility did have COVID, observed Judge Lino S. Lipinsky de Orlov. Specifically, 20 residents tested positive for COVID-19 between April and June 2020, and also 20 staff members. Eight residents died, as did one employee — Gaines.

Ultimately, the panel agreed the evidence supported the idea COVID-19 is an occupational disease that Gaines acquired at his workplace.

“Indeed, the State and Pueblo County public health authorities registered a COVID-19 outbreak at Life Care’s facility on May 29, 2020,” wrote Judge Ted C. Tow III in the May 2 opinion. “Further, there was no credible evidence Gaines contracted the infection anywhere else.”

The case is Life Care Centers of America et al. v. Industrial Claim Appeals Office et al.