Statement of the Case: Part III A

We turn first to the question whether the trial judge correctly stated the law when he charged the jury that an asbestosis claimant, upon demonstrating a reasonable fear of cancer stemming from his present disease, could recover for that fear as part of asbestosis-related pain and suffering damages. See, supra, at 4. In answering this question, we follow the path marked by the Court’s decisions in Consolidated Rail Corporation v. Gottshall, 512 U. S. 532 (1994), and Metro-North Commuter R. Co. v. Buckley, 521 U. S. 424 (1997).

The FELA plaintiff in Gottshall alleged that he witnessed the death of a co-worker while on the job, and that the episode caused him severe emotional distress. 512 U. S., at 536–537. He sought to recover damages from his employer, Conrail, for “mental or emotional harm . . . not directly brought about by a physical injury.” Id., at 544.

Reversing the Court of Appeals’ judgment in favor of the plaintiff, this Court stated that uncabined recognition of claims for negligently inflicted emotional distress would “hol[d] out the very real possibility of nearly infinite and unpredictable liability for defendants.” Id., at 546. Of the “limiting tests . . . developed in the common law,” Ibid., the Court selected the zone-of-danger test to delineate “the proper scope of an employer’s duty under [the] FELA to avoid subjecting its employees to negligently inflicted emotional injury,” Id., at 554.

That test confines recovery for stand-alone emotional distress claims to plaintiffs who: (1) “sustain a physical impact as a result of a defendant’s negligent conduct”; or (2) “are placed in immediate risk of physical harm by that conduct”—that is, those who escaped instant physical harm, but were “within the zone of danger of physical impact.” Id., at 547–548 (internal quotation marks omitted). The Court remanded Gottshall for recon-sideration under the zone-of-danger test. Id., at 558.

In Metro-North, the Court applied the zone-of-danger test to a claim for damages under the FELA, one element of which was fear of cancer stemming from exposure to asbestos. The plaintiff in Metro-North had been intensively exposed to asbestos while working as a pipefitter for Metro-North in New York City’s Grand Central Terminal. At the time of his lawsuit, however, he had a clean bill of health. The Court rejected his entire claim for relief. Exposure alone, the Court held, is insufficient to show “physical impact” under the zone-of-danger test. 521 U. S., at 430.

“[A] simple (though extensive) contact with a carcinogenic substance,” the Court observed, “does not . . . offer much help in separating valid from invalid emotional distress claims.” Id., at 434. The evaluation problem would be formidable, the Court explained, “because contacts, even extensive contacts, with serious carcinogens are common.” Ibid. “The large number of those exposed and the uncertainties that may surround recovery,” the Court added, “suggest what Gottshall called the problem of ‘unlimited and unpredictable liability.’” Id., at 435 (quoting 512 U. S., at 557).

As in Gottshall, the Court distinguished stand-alone distress claims from prayers for damages for emotional pain and suffering tied to a physical injury: “Common-law courts,” the Court recognized, “do permit a plaintiff who suffers from a disease to recover for related negligently caused emotional distress . . . .” 521 U. S., at 432 (empha-sis added).

When a plaintiff suffers from a disease, the Court noted, common-law courts have made “a special effort” to value related emotional distress, “perhaps from a desire to make a physically injured victim whole or be-cause the parties are likely to be in court in any event.” Id., at 436–437.

In sum, our decisions in Gottshall and Metro-North describe two categories: Stand-alone emotional distress claims not provoked by any physical injury, for which Cite as: 538 U. S. ____ (2003) 9 Opinion of the Court recovery is sharply circumscribed by the zone-of-danger test; and emotional distress claims brought on by a physi-cal injury, for which pain and suffering recovery is permit-ted. Norfolk, whose position the principal dissent em-braces, see, e.g., post, at 7, 12 (KENNEDY, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part), would have us ally this case with those in the stand-alone emotional distress category, Brief for Petitioner 16–31; the asbestosis claimants urge its placement in the emotional distress brought on by a physical injury (or disease) category, Brief for Respondents 26.7

Relevant to this characterization question, the parties agree that asbestosis is a cognizable injury under the FELA. See Urie v. Thompson, 337 U. S. 163, 187 (1949) (occupational diseases caused by exposure to hazardous dusts are injuries under the FELA). Norfolk does not dispute that the claimants suffer from asbestosis, see Tr. of Oral Arg. 4, or that asbestosis can be “a clinically serious, often disabling, and progressive disease,” Reply Brief 6 (internal quotation marks omitted).

As Metro-North plainly indicates, pain and suffering damages may include compensation for fear of cancer when that fear “accompanies a physical injury.” 521 U. S., at 430; see Id., at 436 (“The common law permits emotional distress recovery for that category of plaintiffs who suffer from a disease.”). Norfolk, therefore, cannot plausibly maintain that the claimants here, like the plaintiff in Metro-North, “are disease and symptom free.” Id., at 432. The plaintiffs in Gottshall and Metro-North grounded their suit on claims of negligent infliction of emotional distress. The claimants before us, in contrast, complain of a negligently inflicted physical injury (asbestosis) and attendant pain and suffering.

7JUSTICE BREYER, it appears, would not place this case in either of the two above-described categories, but somewhere in between. See post, at 6 (opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part).