The Compensation for Substance-Related Occupational Diseases (TSB) has been providing victims with a shorter and faster route to recognition of their occupational disease since 2023. The path to court is often long and complicated. The employer is not always in the picture anymore, for example, because the company in question has been dissolved.
The current scheme applies to three occupational diseases: lung cancer due to asbestos, allergic occupational asthma, and CSE, also known as painters disease. The cabinet wants to add nasal (sinus) cancer due to wood dust, silicosis (irreversible lung damage due to inflammatory reactions), and lung cancer due to inhalation of silica (quartz dust). These occupational diseases are added based on the estimated number of disease cases in the Netherlands and the availability of data to assess the applications.
The cabinet also wants to increase the chance of approval. Among other changes, the diagnosis established by a qualified physician will be accepted in principle. Checking underlying research will no longer be necessary. The expert panel – which evaluates applications – will have more room to make decisions based on its own expertise and experience. The scheme will also be more widely promoted among medical specialists, patients, and their families. The improvements are expected to lead to more applications being submitted and granted in the long term.
The one-time compensation amounts to over 25,000 euros.
Would you like to respond?
You can respond to all aspects of the proposed expansion of the scheme and the accompanying explanation until Thursday, May 1, 2025, via internetconsultatie.nl.