Karachentsev S. Legal regulation of occupational diseases investigation.

The paper deals with theoretical and practical questions of legal regulation of occupational diseases investigation. A scientific definition was given to an occupational disease. Distinctions from other diseases connected to professional activity as well as from work-related accidents were determined. Occupational disease was considered as a variety of social insurance risk and insurance event under which a worker has the right to receive appropriate compensations occurred due to health damage and work disability. Unlike other social risks these risks can be foreseen and disease can be prevented. That is why employers were charged with duty to create safe working environment for employees, carry out their evaluation and medical examination, and take actions as to disease preventions. The powers of employers and medical preventive institutions in occupational diseases investigation and establishing casual links between work conditions and disease beginning were suited out in details. It was recommended to settle a date of disease beginning from the moment the decision of the MSEC (Medico-social Expert Committee) on work disability is given (under the Act П-4). The conclusion about necessity to draw up a new list of occupational diseases and effective use of labor agreement by applying the International Hazard Datasheets on Occupation was grounded. The author based the conclusion that judicial bodies can cancel an expert report on occupational disease reasons only under irregularities in the proceedings: it was taken without quorum, laboratory test results, if it contains mistakes in issuing sanitary and hygienic characteristics, etc.