On April 30, 1942, appellee received an injury to both his eyes while in the employ of appellant, Peldn Wood Products Company, caused by wood preservative splashing up into his face and eyes when another employee was throwing wood blocks into a vаt containing the preservative. His eyes were treated .at the first aid station. On May 1, he was treated by Dr. Aris W. Cox, an eye specialist in Helena, and on May 3, he was discharged by Dr. Cox as being able to return to work. Two days later, on May 5, he returned to Dr. Cox for treatment and his right еye was found to be infected by gonorrheal germs, which spread to the left eye on May 8. He was treated by Dr. Cox until June 18, after which he did nоt return for' treatment. As a result of this infection he became blind in his left eye.
Appellee filed a claim with the Workmen’s Compensation Commission against appellants who are his employer and its insurance carrier. Claim was allowed by the referee and the Commission at the rate of $9.88 per week for a healing period up to December 16, 1943, and at the same rate for one hundred weеks thereafter, being the period provided by the Workmen’s Compensation Law, Act 319 of 1939. Appellants appealed to the Phillips circuit court, where it was heard on the record made before the Commission and findings and judgment of the Commission were affirmed. This apрeal followed.
It is undisputed that appellee received an injury to his eyes from the splashing of the wood preservative fluid, аnd that within a short-time his eyes became infected with gonorrheal germs which caused blindness in the left eye. It is also undisputed that appеllee did not have gonorrhea or any other venereal disease, and that the infection came from some other sourсe. The Commission found that, “it is recognized that gonorrheal infection, unless checked, will produce blindness, ’ ’ and that “it is reasonable tо assume that the infection found a ready portal of entry in the already inflamed and irritated eye of this claimant. In the opinion of the Commission, the chain of causation has been established by this claimant, the liquid which was being used in his employment produced the irritation that offered a ready harbor for the gonorrheal infection that spread to the left eye and produced the blindness in the сlaimant’s left eye.”
For a reversal of the judgment of the circuit court, appellants make two contentions: 1. That it is speculation and conjecture for the Commission to say that the irritated condition of the eyes made them more susceptible to the infection, and that-blindness would not have occurred except for the irritation; and 2, but assuming the Commission was justified in so finding, the germ infection was an intervening efficient cause, for which appellants are not liable.
1. While no witness testified that the irritation to appellee’s eyes made them more susceptible to gonorrheal infection, we think the Commission had the right, in the exercise of sound judgment and discretion, to make the finding in this regard that it did make. It seems to us, as it did the Commission, a reasonable assumption that an inflamed and irritated eye, а conjunctivitis as the doctor «^gstified, would be a ready portal of entry for the germ he did get' or some other destructive germ that he might hаve gotten.
2. Nor can we agree with appellants that the germ infection which 'Caused his blindness in the left eye was such an intervening effiсient cause as to excuse them from responsibility under said act. To support their contentions in this regard, appellants cite a number of cases to the effect “that an employee can only recover for a disability that is caused entirely by the accident which he received in his employment, and that the employer is not responsible for any part of a disability that has beеn occasioned by another independent agency that has intervened after the accident occurred.” Bunge Bros. Coаl Co. v. Industrial Commission,
The judgment is accordingly affirmed.