When children catch a disease.

Are You Liable When Children Catch a Disease in Your Program?

By Tom Copeland. Poster with his permission

 It started as a normal day in Kim Mueller's family child care home in Minnesota, when suddenly four unrelated children started vomiting within thirty minutes.

She suspected that it was an outbreak of Norovirus, so she immediately called the parents and asked everyone to pick up their children as soon as possible. She also announced that she was closing the following day (Friday).

By Saturday seven children and several parents had become ill. Kim called her licensor, and the state Department of Health and an Epidemiologist confirmed that it was Norovirus.

Kim had a strict policy that did not allow sick children to come and required parents to pick up children who become ill during the day. Despite this, in the past parents had used medications to mask fever and didn't tell Kim their child had been sick when they showed up for care.

Kim did all the right things. She followed all the state's recommendations to prevent the spread of illness. In fact, she, her co-provider and her daughter did not come down with Norovirus.

Parent Complaint

Most of Kim's parents were very understanding. However, one family who had a vacation planned for that weekend was very angry and blamed her when their entire family caught the virus.

The parents are accusing Kim of ruining their vacation and they want her to pay for their vacation.

Is Kim Liable?

Kim worries that she might be liable in this situation for the costs associated the children and parents getting sick.

This is a concern for many providers. What if the children had gotten measles or some other contagious disease?

Kim is not liable for children becoming ill in her program and is not responsible for financial losses suffered by the parents in this case.

Unless you are negligent in your care of children, you can't be held responsible for children getting sick. Negligence would be if a provider deliberately ignored an obvious injury or fever, failed to follow written instructions from parents about giving a child medications, or failed to inform a parent when a child in her program contracted a contagious disease.

If a parent did sue you because their child became ill while in your program, your business liability insurance policy will likely defend you. Another reason to get this insurance!

I would suggest telling the unhappy parent, "I don't know where the Norovirus came from, but it looks like it didn't come from my family. I did everything I could to prevent the spread of the disease. I following all licensing regulations. Ultimately, despite all the precautions I take, I can't ensure that you child will never become sick while attending my program. I am sorry that this was an inconvenience for you, but I'm not responsible for any of your financial loss. I won't be charging you for days your child misses care because of this illness."

Other Issues

You should protect the privacy of your families by not releasing the names of children who become ill. If you know who brought the contagious disease (or lice) into your program, you should not share this information with parents. Tell the parents how you are handling the outbreak. It doesn't matter to them how it got started.

I believe it's reasonable not to charge parents for days their child misses care because of an outbreak of a contagious illness. Many providers have policies that allow parents to keep their child at home when she becomes ill and do not charge for a set number of days. It's up to you what to put in your policies.

Tom Copeland - www.tomcopelandblog.com

Image credit: www.foodsafetynews.com