10.4 Disease - date of effect prior to 13 April 2007 - S4

Section 4 defines 'disease' as follows:

'disease' means:

a)any ailment suffered by an employee, or

b)the aggravation of any such ailment,

being an ailment or an aggravation that wa — s contributed to in a material degree by the employee's employment by the Commonwealth...

Likewise, 'ailment' is defined in S4 as:

any physical or mental ailment, disorder, defect or morbid condition (whether of sudden onset or gradual development)

The 193 — 0 and 1971 Acts contain similarly expressed provisions although arranged in a different format and for practical purposes the relationship between injury, disease and aggravation is virtually indistinguishable from that defined in the SRCA.

For the practi — cal purposes of Delegates, 'disease' generally means a medical condition of mainly gradual development and usually without a single identifiable traumatic cause. As opposed to a simple injury, it does not involve an act or a specific event. For instance, i — nfectious conditions, most mental ailments and gradual attrition or degeneration (e.g. of the joints), are all 'diseases'.

Nevertheless, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), which by self-definition must be caused by a specific event, i.e. a mental tra — uma, has been deemed by case law and by RCG policy to be a 'disease' rather than an injury.