Neudeck v. Ford Motor Co.

• Decision Date: 06 March 1930
• Docket Number: No. 46.,46.
• Citation: 229 N.W. 438,249 Mich. 690
• Parties: NEUDECK v. FORD MOTOR CO.
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court

249 Mich. 690

229 N.W. 438

NEUDECK

v.FORD MOTOR CO.

No. 46.

Supreme Court of Michigan.

March 6, 1930.

Certiorari to Department of Labor and Industry.

Compensation proceedings by Delia Neudeck, claimant, opposed by the Ford Motor Company, employer. To review an award of the Department of Labor and Industry, the employer brings certiorari.

Affirmed.

Argued before the Entire Bench, except McDONALD, J.George H. Anderson, of Detroit, for appellant.

Geo. D. O'Brien, of Detroit, for appellee.

FEAD, J.

The case was submitted upon the following statement of facts: ‘Louis Neudeck, deceased, husband of Delia Neudeck, claimant, was employed by the Ford Motor Company in latter part of July, 1928, and immediately upon being employed he was ordered by the officials of the Ford Motor Company to be vaccinated and he was vaccinated thereupon, at the Ford Motor Company's plant, and by a doctor employed by the Ford Motor Company; as an effect of said vaccination Mr. Neudeck incurred a streptococcus poisoning, the focus of the infection being the vaccinated arm and as a consequence Mr. Neudeck died of a streptococcus poison September 3rd, 1928. The claimant, Delia Neudeck, was totally dependent on the deceased, Louis Neudeck.’

To this was added the testimony of the chief surgeon of defendant that defendant had been requested by the Detroit board of health to have vaccinated against smallpox all new employees and old ones not successfully vaccinated within five years. Defendant complied with the request as to new employees, but did not as to old ones.

Defendant contends the vaccination was not an accident, and, if the infection was an accident, there was no proof that the germs entered the wound at the time of vaccination or during the time deceased was at work. Krout v. J. L. Hudson Co., 200 Mich. 287, 166 N. W. 848, L. R. A. 1918F, 860.

In 39 A. L. R. 872 note, it is said: ‘An external infection which has been distinctly traced to a definite point of contact, such as a scratch or abrasion, and to a definite time, being of an unusual nature and generally happening suddenly or unexpectedly, is generally held to constitute an accident, or an injury by accident, within the meaning of the act.’

The rule is sustained by the decisions of this court in Cline v. Studebaker Corporation, 189 Mich. 514, 155 N. W. 519, L. R. A. 1916C, 1139, where an infection developed in an eye from an attempt of a fellow workman to remove a piece of steel from it; Blaess v. Dolph, 195 Mich. 137, 161 N. W. 885, where an undertaker's assistant became infected through a slight cut on his finger while working on the body of a person who had died from infection; and Dove v. Alpena Hide & Leather Co., 198 Mich. 132, 164 N. W. 253, where a workman became infected through the respiratory system from handling hides. In all of these cases the infection was held to be an accident. In Frankamp v. Fordney Hotel, 222 Mich. 525, 193 N. W. 204, also, where a head waitress contracted typhoid fever from drinking water provided by the employer, the disease was held an...