Employee Who Voluntarily Fails to Take Prescribed Medication Not Protected Under ADA
May 1, 2000
The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) prohibits employers from
discriminating against individuals with a disability. Someone is disabled if he
or she has a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more
major life activities. What if an employee has an impairment, and also has the
means, through technology, medication, or some other measure to control the
effects of the impairment, but voluntarily decides not to do so? Is that
employee entitled to the protection of the ADA if that failure to control the
disability affects the employee’s performance and leads to termination?
According to several courts that have ruled on the issue: No.
In Murphy v. United Parcel Service, (1999) and Sutton v. United Airlines,
Inc., (1999), the Supreme Court held that an individual who takes medication
which alleviates the effects of his or her impairment, and which allows that
person to perform major life activities, is not disabled under the ADA.
Similarly, several lower courts have held an employee’s voluntary failure to
control a disability, which failure results in termination, deprives that
employee of the protection of the ADA. For example, in Burrows v. City of
Springfield, (8th Cir. 1998), a police recruit suffering from diabetes suffered
two diabetic hypoglycemic episodes causing him to become disoriented and
dysfunctional while on duty. It was undisputed that the two episodes resulted
from voluntary changes in the recruit’s eating schedule. The city removed the
recruit from active duty. The Court noted that the recruit’s "own eating
schedule is a matter within his control." The employee in Siefken v.
Village of Arlington Heights, (7th Cir. 1995) was also a diabetic. He failed to
monitor his condition, experienced a diabetic reaction that resulted in
disorientation and memory loss while on duty, and was discharged as a result.
Because control of the diabetes was within the employee’s power, the Court
granted the defendant’s motion to dismiss.
In Tangires v. The Johns-Hopkins Hospital, (D. Md. 2000), an employee refused
to take certain medications and follow her doctor’s orders for the treatment
of asthma based on her unsubstantiated belief the medications would harm her.
Her failure to take medications resulted in prolonged absences from work, and
ultimately resulted in the hospital placing her on medical layoff. The employee
challenged the layoff under the ADA, but the court found that she was not
disabled because her condition was readily treatable.
Each of the courts that have ruled on this issue have stated that the cause
of the employee’s termination or layoff was not a disability, but the employee’s
voluntary failure to control that disability. Similarly, the EEOC, in its
Enforcement Guidance concerning Reasonable Accommodation, has stated that it is
not an employer’s responsibility to make sure that an employee takes
medication as prescribed because doing so does not remove a workplace barrier.
The logical result of that position is that when an employee fails to take his
or her medication, and job performance suffers resulting in termination, the
employee may not invoke the ADA to challenge the termination.
Employers should make sure that relevant state statutes have not been amended
to provide that whether a person has a disability is to be determined without
regard to the availability or use of mitigating measures such as medications.
Such a bill is currently pending in the Rhode Island General Assembly. If
enacted, courts could find that an employee’s voluntary failure to control a
disability does not deprive him or her of the protection of state statutes
prohibiting discrimination against the disabled.
For more information please contact Neal McNamara at 1-888-688-8500 or
nmcnamar@hklaw.com.
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