Connecticut Dermatology Group, PC v. Twin City Fire Ins. Co.

Citations

• 346 Conn. 33

Syllabus

The plaintiffs, which own and operate healthcare facilities in Connecticut, sought, inter alia, a judgment declaring that the defendant insurers were required to provide coverage under certain commercial insurance policies for losses the plaintiffs sustained as a result of their suspension of business operations during the COVID-19 pandemic. The defendants insured the plaintiffs under separate but virtually identical insurance policies, which provided that the defendants would ''pay for direct physi- cal loss of or physical damage to'' covered property caused by or resulting from a covered cause of loss. The policies included a business income provision providing that the defendants would pay for the actual loss of business income they sustained ''due to the necessary suspension of'' their operations during the ''period of restoration,'' which the policies defined in relevant part as beginning ''with the date of direct physical loss . . . caused by or resulting from a [c]overed . . . [l]oss'' and ending on the date when the property ''should be repaired, rebuilt or replaced . . . .'' The policies also contained an exclusion for loss or damage caused by the presence, growth, proliferation, or spread of a virus. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, various government officials and agencies had issued orders, recommendations and guidelines intended to prevent or slow the spread of the disease. In light of this response, the plaintiffs suspended their business operations and, as a result, lost business income and incurred costs in connection with sanitation and the erection of physical barriers, for which they submitted claims to the defendants. The defendants denied the plaintiffs' claims on the ground that, because the coronavirus did not cause property damage at the plaintiffs' respective places of business, the claimed losses were not covered. The parties filed separate motions for summary judgment. The plaintiffs and the defendants disputed whether the policies co