97-52. Occupational disease made compensable; "accident" defined.
Disablement or death of an employee resulting from an occupational disease described in G.S. 97-53 shall be treated as the happening of an injury by accident within the meaning of the North Carolina Workers' Compensation Act and the procedure and practice and compensation and other benefits provided by said act shall apply in all such cases except as hereinafter otherwise provided. The word "accident," as used in the Workers' Compensation Act, shall not be construed to mean a series of events in employment, of a similar or like nature, occurring regularly, continuously or at frequent intervals in the course of such employment, over extended periods of time, whether such events may or may not be attributable to fault of the employer and disease attributable to such causes shall be compensable only if culminating in an occupational disease mentioned in and compensable under this Article: Provided, however, no compensation shall be payable for asbestosis and/or silicosis as hereinafter defined if the employee, at the time of entering into the employment of the employer by whom compensation would otherwise be payable, falsely represented himself in writing as not having previously been disabled or laid off because of asbestosis or silicosis.