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Medical Care and Sickness Benefits Convention, 1969 (No. 130) - Norway (RATIFICATION: 1972)

Part III (Sickness benefit), Article 18, in relation to Articles 7(b) and 26 of the Convention. In its previous comments, the Committee asked the Government to supply information on the application in practice of the amendment of 21 December 1990 of the National Insurance Act, according to which cash benefit in the event of sickness can be provided for a period of up to 12 weeks if the insured person is totally incapable of work in the job that he or she held at the time of falling ill, but is capable of performing other types of remunerated work (section 3-2, subparagraph 1). In reply, the Government indicates that this scheme is a voluntary agreement which has only been used in 2.4 per cent of cases. The number of cases is too low to see any effect in practice and it is too early to draw any conclusions in this respect. Both the Ministry of Health and Social Affairs and the National Insurance Administration want the scheme to be used more often and the latter is now drawing up new instructions to the social security offices. The Committee would like to be kept informed of any substantial changes in the situation.