A German man slipped and broke his back walking from his bed to his home office. A court ruled it a workplace accident.

• A man in Germany tripped and broke his back on his walk from his bed to his home office.
• His employer's insurance denied covering it as a workplace accident.

A German court ruled on Wednesday that a man who slipped on his walk from his bed to his home office in 2018 qualified as a workplace accident.

The court ruling said the man broke his back while going down a spiral staircase to get to his home office, and the Federal Social Court qualified that as a "commute."

The unnamed man's employer's insurance had denied covering the accident, but the court said that the "first morning journey from bed to the home office [was] an insured work route.'

"If the insured activity is carried out in the household of the insured person or at another location, insurance cover is provided to the same extent as when the activity is carried out at the company premises," the court said.

The court said that the man starts working without making breakfast and so the walk "was only used to start work for the first time and is therefore insured as a service in the interests of the employer."

The ruling comes at a time when people all across the world are navigating work from home situations because of the pandemic.