The administrative court of Marseille on Thursday recognized the existence of a "direct link" between a nurse's breast cancer and her working conditions at night for nearly 25 years, finding that her illness was attributable to her service.
As a result, the court overturned the decision of the director of the Martigues hospital center who had rejected in 2021 the nurse's request for "recognition of liability", who had also been refused her request for recognition of occupational disease in 2019.
In its decision, the court recalls that "an illness contracted by a civil servant is attributable to the public hospital service if it has a direct link with his working conditions, allowing its development unless particular circumstances are at its origin."
However, the court points out, "while most of the causes of the disease remain unknown, scientific studies since 2007 have revealed the effects of night work on women's hormonal functions, leading to an increased risk of cancer."
The nurse, diagnosed with cancer in 2014, worked at the hospital in Martigues for almost 25 years "exclusively at night, with an average of 140 nights per year," the court emphasizes, noting that "other known risk factors such as genetic, hormonal and environmental and hygiene-dietary factors are, in this nurse, weak or even absent."
He judges that, under these conditions, "there is a sufficiently high probability of a direct link between the pathology suffered by the nurse and her night working conditions which led to the development of this disease."
He therefore "orders the hospital to recognize that the illness is attributable to the service."
“This is a very good decision,” reacted Elisabeth Leroux, the lawyer for the nurse who, thanks to this decision, will be able to benefit from “a lifetime annuity calculated according to the rate of permanent or partial disability that will be granted to her.” “This is very important because they often become ill at a young age,” she explained.
The deadliest cancer among women in France, with 12,000 deaths per year, breast cancer is a disease whose risk factors are still being explored: night work was deemed "probably carcinogenic" in 2007 by the International Agency for Research on Cancer, an agency of the WHO which also classified X-rays and Gamma rays as "known carcinogens".
Working nights more than two nights a week for more than 10 years triples the risk, the National Institute of Health and Medical Research estimated in 2018.
Until now, very few women have had their breast cancer recognized as an occupational disease, which entitles them to compensation. The first, in 2023, was a nurse from the Moselle region who was exposed to radiation and worked night shifts at the hospital for 28 years.
"We still have a lot of trouble obtaining this recognition despite a concordant scientific literature," laments Mr. Leroux.
Although several cases have already been won – amicably or in court – for nurses and nursing assistants, most often accumulating multiple exposures (night work and ionizing radiation), proceedings are currently underway to have prostate cancer – also a hormone-dependent cancer – recognized as an occupational disease in night workers, the lawyer explains.
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