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Belcher v. T. Rowe Price Foundation Inc.3/25/1993
of Special Appeals in Sargent had already interpreted "accidental personal injury" to include physiological changes. Thus, while I agree that Belcher's claim is not barred, I also believe that this Court should respect the intent of the General Assembly and refrain from covering the purely mental-mental claim with the mantle of "accidental personal injury."
Further, recent and ongoing executive and legislative economic studies that seek to balance benefit to workers against cost to employers should dictate against this Court's economically uninformed disruption of that balance by expanding the Act to include mental-mental claims. On December 31, 1985, the Maryland Department of Economic and Community Development (DECD) issued a report that compared Maryland's workers' compensation costs in fifty-one occupational classes with those of twenty-nine other states. DECD, Workers' Compensation in Maryland 34 (1985) (the DECD Report). It found that Maryland "ranked in the high-cost third of the 30 states with respect to Standard Earned Premium (SEP), indemnity losses, and total losses." Id. at 73. The Report also found that "Maryland . . . ranked in the high-cost third in all categories under permanent partial injuries, including indemnity losses, medical losses, total losses and claim count." Id. Identified as possible areas of reform were permanent partial awards, medical cost containment, use of standardized medical guides, competitive rating -- modified file-and-use, data collection and reporting, and safety in the workplace. Id. at 77-84.
On December 31, 1985, another group, the Ad-Hoc Working Group on Workers' Compensation (the Working Group), issued a report, also entitled, "Workers' Compensation in Maryland." Working Group, Workers' Compensation in Maryland (1985). The Working Group was comprised of members from organized labor, the business community, and "researchers familiar with the availability and quality of data on Maryland's workers' compensation experience." Id. at 3. The Working Group's purpose was "to propose cost effective initiatives for Maryland's workers' compensation system." Id. at 1. In its report, the Working Group made numerous recommendations, several of which were the same as those made in the DECD Report.
By Executive Order 01.01.1986.11, on June 5, 1986, Governor Hughes established the Governor's Commission to Study the Worker's Compensation System (the Commission). 13 Md.Reg. 1575 (July 3, 1986). The impetus for the Governor's Executive Order came from the DECD Report and the Working Group's report. See id. The Executive Order charged the Commission with reviewing the laws, procedures and other matters relating to "the cost of workers' compensation and the efficient provision of adequate benefits to Maryland workers," and with recommending changes. Id.
The Commission replaced the Governor's Commission on Workmen's Compensation Laws. That commission "focused more on the issues of efficiency and fairness in the implementation of the worker's compensation law, and did not have the specific cost reduction mandate of the new Commission." Department of Fiscal Services, Staff Report on Worker's Compensation in Maryland: Briefing Paper for the 1987 General Assembly 10 (Jan. 19, 1987).
The Commission reported in January 1987. Governor's Commission to Study the Workers' Compensation System, Report of the Governor's Commission to Study the Workers' Compensation System (1987) (the Commission Report). The Executive Summary to the Commission Report stated:
"The workers' compensation system is a major social program in Maryland, providing Maryland's two million workers with remedies for work-related injuries and illnesses. Pr
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