If You Hire an Obese Worker, You May Have to Pay for Their Weight-Loss Surgery

Maybe it's the bad economy.  Or perhaps it's just bad karma.  But for whatever reason, there's been a huge spike recently in what I can only characterize as unbelievable lawsuits.

Let's say you operate a restaurant.  Now, restaurants fail at a high rate in even the best of times, but in an economic downturn, they fail in droves.  And if the following incident happened to your restaurant, I suspect you'd shut it down the next day.

A prospect applies for a job as a cook at your pizza shop.  Sure, he weighs 380 pounds, but since the Americans with Disabilities Act forbids discrimination against the "morbidly obese," you decide to hire him. 

All goes well for a time.  Then one day, a freezer door hits the cook in the back.  Your worker's compensation coverage is adequate to pay for the cook's back surgery.  But what happens next is classic American lawsuit mania. 

Naturally, the cook hires a lawyer.  A few days before the cook's surgery, his lawyer calls.  It seems the cook must undergo weight-loss surgery before the back surgery.  Doctors have advised him the weight-loss surgery is necessary to insure the success of the back operation.  And, the lawyer says, you must pay the $20,000 cost for the weight loss surgery, since it exceeds your worker's compensation insurance limits.

Now, you hire a lawyer.  Your lawyer tells you that you shouldn’t have to pay.  So the cook sues you and your business for $20,000.  You lose the case, but your lawyer tells you that you can appeal.  You appeal the decision, and lose again at the appellate court level.

In a nutshell, that's what's happened to an Indiana pizza shop earlier this year.  On August 6, the Indiana Court of Appeals ruled that a pizza shop must pay the cost of lap-band surgery for an obese cook injured at work.  And this trend isn't just occurring in Indiana.  Only three weeks later, the Oregon Supreme Court issued a similar ruling.

Advocates for the disabled—and especially their lawyers—are thrilled with these rulings.  But, in the real world, the results won't be so rosy.  Given court decisions like these, any rational employer will hesitate to hire any employee with a pre-existing health condition that may be aggravated in the workplace.  Assuming, of course, that the employer hasn't closed up shop already—and let all his employees go.

Copyright © 2009 by Mark Nestmann

Comments

[Andrew Jhonson]

Very nice information...keep it up.

Thanks