Vitnija Saldava, The Associated Press
Published Thursday, December 18, 2014
7:26AM EST
Last Updated Thursday, December 18, 2014
12:16PM EST
The European Court of Justice ruled, obesity can be a form of disability.
A Danish childcare worker Karsten Kaltoft, weighs 350 pounds, claimed he
got laid off for his obesity. Kaltoft had been a childcare worker for 15 years
in the Municipality of Billund in Denmark until he was dismissed in 2010.The
municipality refutes as a result declining number of children, Kaltoft's
position became unnecessary. The ruling said if obesity interferes a "full
and effective participation in professional life," it could be categorized
to disability.
Jacob Sand, Kaltoft's lawyer, pointed out under European Union law,
employers will require providing special services for their obese staff members
who are considered disabled because discrimination on the grounds of disability
is illegal.
The special service could be providing car parking spaces closer to the
office, change workers' desks for their fit and other changes that need to be
done. The ruling could make it difficult for employers to fire or lay off
overweight workers.
My Opinion...
Obesity
itself is not a disability. However, if
obesity interferes with effective
conduct of individual or efficient
performance of obese workers, obesity can be considered
as a form of disability. It does not seem like an accurate decision to define fat people as
disabled. Classifying obese as disability should take the cause of
obesity into account.
If
one’s obesity is genetic or caused by a disease,
I do not think the person should
receive penalize discrimination in his/her workplaces. However,
in many cases obesity comes from bad eating habits, food intake regulation failure,
or lack of exercise. Such facets of a
person’s failed self-management are personal responsibility.
If
obesity wasn’t inevitably caused from a
disease or genetically inherited, I think there is no
need to give a particular benefit to obese people who are classified as
disabled.
Just
the fact obesity interfered with performance of work should
not be served as a benchmark for judging obesity as a disability. The cause
of obesity should be included as the basis as well. For
instance, if an employee’s obesity was from neglecting personal health care and
his/her work was not carried out properly, in this case
the employee should not consider as a disabled
nor deserve benefits.
Determining
obese as a form disability should be
judged more carefully
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